


Fire and Ice

by Elohiniar



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Adult Rin (InuYasha), Best, Canon Disabled Character, Complete, Excellent, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Ice Skating, Injury, Inspiration, Lemon, M/M, Neurology & Neuroscience, Paralysis, Recovery, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-02-24 18:47:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 139,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22362712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elohiniar/pseuds/Elohiniar
Summary: He was a three time Olympic Gymnast on track to set records, she was an ex-figure skater turned Physical Therapist, but after a bad fall Sesshomaru's is paralyzed from the waist down and Rin hasn't stepped on the ice in nearly a decade. Can Rin help Sesshomaru to walk again and can he give her the courage to skate again?
Relationships: Higurashi Kagome/InuYasha, Inu no Taishou/Izayoi, Miroku/Sango (InuYasha), Rin/Sesshoumaru (InuYasha)
Comments: 393
Kudos: 148





	1. Interviews

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin, a recent grad for physical therapy, is interviewing at the Band of Seven and she's about to get more than she bargained for.
> 
> This Chapter was beta'd by the lovely Laureninthesky

**Rin**

This can’t be. There should be a law against twenty-four year old ex-ice skaters having to wear business suits. I’m sure my full length mirror is lying and my hips have not filled out that much since I looked at them last. I tug on the front of my blazer to try to make it look neater and pull my hair into a tight ponytail. All that’s left is to give my bangs a bit of a lift with my straight iron but all that happens is that I burn my forehead and curse loud enough my brother Kohaku comes running in asking me what happened. “Nothing I just singed my forehead. How do I look?”

“Like you’d rather eat lead than go to the interview.” He’s a tall boy…man at twenty seven with deep brown eyes that girls just die for and thick hair that makes all the ladies drool. I know because they tell me when they leave our apartment in the morning. By day he is a barista at the local Starbucks and at night he works as a bouncer at a club.

“Shut up,” I laugh at him and take another pass at my messy bangs, finally getting them into a proper bounce and slide on my most comfortable flats. “Band of Seven Rehabilitation Center, here I come.”

“Go knock ‘em dead sis,” he wraps his arms around me and rests his chin on top of mine. “I bet you’ll kill it.”

I take a cleansing breath like they teach in my yoga class every morning and head out the door. We live in a simple seventh floor apartment in the middle of Denver, Colorado. It’s in Glendale which is the only reason we can afford it on our salaries. I just finished my PhD in Rehabilitation Science. I fell in love with it after I injured my knee in high school skating. Skating, yeah I’m a former figure skater. I won Worlds two years in a row and was slated to skate in the 2010 winter Olympic but during practice I was going to throw a triple axel, triple loop, double toe combo and sometimes what goes up comes down really fucking hard. I landed sideways, slammed my head into the ice and my knee twisted. That was it, my career was over.

At sixteen I already had my GED so I could focus on training, so I went straight to college. If it weren’t for my amazing therapists who helped me see the sun shining when I couldn’t, I would have stayed in my bed and cried. I was that close to an Olympic Gold. Now my medals decorate a hidden space in my closet and everyone has forgotten about Rin Matthews. I bet you’re wondering how I don’t have more money? Well, when you spend more time skating than studying there is no scholarship out there waiting for you and when your knee is so busted up it takes two years to even be able to walk normally again, well you get my point. All my sponsors dropped me and to be honest, I haven’t set foot on the ice since.

Kohaku and I moved in together to save money on rent and so we didn’t have to keep living with our older sister Sango and her husband Miroku, they just had a set of the most adorable twin girls six months ago. So here we are, if I can nail this interview, I can quit my job at the coffee shop and trust me, my income will more than make it possible for me to live by myself.

* * *

The tinkle of a gold bell above my head announces my entrance into the Band of Seven Rehabilitation Center. It has that sweat smell that I fell in love with when I was doing my own physical therapy. It’s run by seven brothers who all took turns working to make sure the next brother had enough money to pay for school. I graduated with Jakotsu, the youngest. “Hey girl!” He runs over to me and pulls me into a big hug smiling. “You look like you have a pipe up your ass! What’s with this suit?” He’s sporting two pigtails today and a bright pink sundress and I swear he has bigger swagger in his hips than I do.

“You said dress professional,” I follow him through the therapeutic tables in the facility. There are elderly working on their endurance on bikes and treadmills, but it’s in the back that I want to work. A man in a wheelchair lifts himself onto the table to do exercises with what little strength is left in his legs. The goal is to keep them from atrophying and help them keep the circulation strong in their legs. Another woman looks like a recent leg amputation, she’ll be learning balance all over again. You’ve never experienced hope and meaning until you’ve worked with someone who feels like they’ve lost it all and come back stronger than they were before.

“I said dress to accentuate your assets and those dumps are too covered, take that off.” He grabs my jacket and twirls me out of it. “Can I take scissors to that skirt honey, because if I had legs like that.”

“You do have legs like that,” I remind him and he starts laughing. “I’m here to interview for a job not to sell my body.”

“Whatever honey, come on, Bankotsu is waiting for you.” He pushes me into the office and shuts it behind him. Inside is an intimidating man that towers over me by easily eight inches and I take a seat waiting for him to finish on his computer.

“Stop fidgeting,” he says as his eyes don’t leave the computer screen. “I once saw someone so nervous they tore a hole through their skirt doing what you are with your fingers.”

I stop twirling the cloth in my fingers and say, “I’m Rin Matthews.”

“I know that. Rin Matthews, GPA 3.87, you graduated top of your class. You Interned with Kagura at the Wind and you’re looking for what I hope is a full-time job.” He finally turns and leans back in his chair. “I run a busy facility, I’m sure you saw from outside. It’s slow right now, but gets busy again after 3pm. We work with a diverse set of clients from children up to geriatrics, some are former athletes, some have survived cancer, leukemia and they all have a story to tell. So tell me Rin, what’s yours?”

I purse my lips and take a deep breath, just like I practiced with Kohaku, “well I’m twenty five years old and I just graduated—”

“Beyond that Ms. Matthews, I know you just finished at University of Colorado but what else can you tell me about yourself? I'm looking for someone who is a go getter, who will help my clients reach their goals and achieve their dreams.”

It’s then I know while I stare into eyes that have iced over that it’s time to tell my story. “I was a professional figure skater on the Olympic track until I had a bad fall in practice and broke my knee. I spent two years in rehab and it ended my career, which when you’re fifteen and skating is all you’ve known, you lose hope. My therapists helped me see that the sun does come up the next day, that pain is part of the process and that I was so much more than what happened to my knee. I want to give back what was given to me.” Another deep breath is needed after all that because I forgot to breathe in between sentences.

“You’re _the Rin Matthews?_ ” he asks like I’ve fallen from heaven into his lap. “The first female to land a perfect quad double?”

“That’s me.” I raise my hand sheepishly.

“You dropped off the face of the planet after that fall,” he says quietly flipping through some papers on his desk.

“Wouldn’t you?” I ask him nervously and maybe more defensive than I meant to. “I was fifteen and my career was over. I had three operations on my knee, and couldn’t walk again for a year. School was my lifeline, it gave me hope and I guess that’s why I’m here.”

He smiles and I finally feel like I’ve said something right.

“Well, we might have a position for you then, let’s go on a tour and you can tell me more about your internships, and I see you volunteered at Wind during your undergrad?”

“Wind had a pediatric ward and I really liked that. But during my internships I really fell in love with paraplegic physiotherapy. I dated this guy that was into Neurosurgery and he got me into spinal care and how with the right help they can get back on their feet, literally and even if they can’t, there is so much they can still do.”

We rove through the facility, seeing the baths where they use hot and cold water to treat chronic injuries and then through the exercise equipment and then he stops at the front desk where a woman in her mid-twenties answers the phone. I tell him more of my story about the boy I helped learn to walk again after he was in a car accident, the woman who was walking in the street when a car hit her and how her happiest moment was being able to hold her baby again and my personal favorite, a young football player who was injured cliff diving with his friends. He had a full ride to UCLA and lost it. He thought he had nothing left after his neck broke but as the swelling went down and he kept working, he gained use of his arms again and became a paralympic athlete. He’s set to win the ski competition.

“You never thought about competing again?” Suikotsu, the second brother asks me as he helps a teenager into her wheelchair.

“No,” I say quickly shaking my head. What I don’t say is that the first time I tried to get back on the ice, my palms got so sweaty and my knees so shaky I couldn’t make myself do it. “It was a bad injury.”

“How is it now?” Bankotsu asks.

“It only hurts when it rains,” I say proudly shaking out my right leg.

“Honey those legs are to die for!” Jakotsu calls while helping a boy walk using the parallel bars. “I’d tap her myself I didn’t like—”

“Jak!” Renkotsu calls from next to him, where he’s helping a teenage girl do sit-ups.

“You like boys,” the little boy says with a grin that’s missing a few teeth.

“Honey I don’t like boys, I like men. We’re talking tall, built, square jaw, high-cheekboned…oh honey, here comes Puddles.”

“Puddles?” I turn around to see rolling through the facility are two silver haired men. One is pushing the other, they look similar and different all at once, but one thing is for sure, the one in the wheelchair looks pissed.

“I would tap that ass even if he couldn’t move it,” Jakotsu throws an arm around me. “Hey Ban, what if we gave little Rin here a test run?”

“She’s not covered by our insurance,” Bankotsu throws back.

“I’ll supervise her,” Suikotsu says.

“What?” I can’t speak. I interned at Wind but that was always with another therapist.

“If you can get him to do more than sit in that chair, the job is yours,” Bankotsu says circling me then walking away.

“Jak!” I call him running over. “Quick, give me the rundown on this guy.”

“Sesshomaru Takahashi. Danny, you sit tight in that chair until I come get you,” he points at the little boy who made it all the way across the parallel bars. “He’s twenty eight.”

“The Sesshomaru Takahashi?”

“Lord Sesshomaru himself honey listen to me, he is grumpier than a snake that’s been stepped on by a drunk. He had lumbar injury after flipping out of control on his last salto pike on the rings four years ago. His brother brings him here, that cutie with those doggy ears. I wish he was gay.”

“Jak!” I need details to get his ass out of that chair, not how hot his brother is.

“So he comes here five days a week, at 3pm exactly. He rolls up to that bed and he refuses to get out of that chair. He’s been with us four years, if we get lucky we get him to do some stretches in his chair but he is something else. He had it all and he lost it all.”

“I know what that’s like. Why do you call him Puddles?” God do I know what it’s like to think you are going to win and then fall. I just didn’t do it during competition, and that was his third Olympics.

“Puddles pity party, don’t you watch AGT?” He gets Danny out of his chair and back onto the bars.

“No wonder you nearly failed your last semester.”

“Girl shut up! If Mukotsu hears that he’s going to kill me. I cut in line, he was supposed to go to college next, not me. Oh baby look at your bad self!” Jak jumps up and down laughing as the boy makes it to the end. “You keep walking like that your daddy is gonna have to lock up all the candy and the pretty girls!”

“I don’t like girls,” the little boy giggles.

“You got a boyfriend in second grade?”

“No, I like cookies. Girls are gross.”

I swallow the incredibly large lump in my throat as the silver haired man is rolled past me and left next to one of the physical therapy beds. “Great,” I tighten my pony tail. “I can do this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment and Kudo!!!


	2. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru tries to avoid Rin's attempts to get him out of his wheel chair. Can she help him get pumped for life again?
> 
> This Chapter was beta'd by the lovely Laureninthesky

**Sesshomaru**

“I’ll be back in an hour,” Inuyasha informs me as he walks away and I set an arm on the ridiculous blue covered bed that I know Suikotsu will try to get me on. I’m told that moving my limbs will help them heal, that it will decrease my pain but all it really does is remind me that I haven’t felt anything below my waist in four years, therefore what is the point? I’ve been told I will never walk again, does it really matter if someone else moves my limbs?

So I sit and wait for the idiot doctor to come. To my dismay though, it’s not Suikotsu that starts walking in my direction.

If the devil were a female, she would wear a black skirt that covers her knees and makes her hips look fat with a flouncy, ruffled, baby pink button down shirt that screams second class and no taste, not to mention flats. “Since when do therapists wear shoes like that?” Let’s see if I can get her to quit like the last one that was interning with Suikotsu.

She wrinkles her nose at me, which for a moment I find adorable because it accentuates the freckles on her cheeks and nose. “Since when do patients come in with attitudes like this? I’m Rin Matthews.” She holds her hand out to me smiling.

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t get up,” I refuse to take her hand.

“Okay,” her voice screams first day nerves. Great, all I need is an amateur.

“First day?” I’m not sure I need the answer to this question.

“Something like that. Well, why don’t we start with getting to know each other?” Optimism, she screams happy, like orphan Annie running through the streets singing about how the sun will come out tomorrow. For years my sun was gymnastics. I learned to flip and cartwheel the way other boys devoured sports. It started when my mother enrolled me in a local gymkhana to blow off energy, that was before my father ran out on my mother and had the ass that brought me in here. I progressed quickly from one level to the next , excelling at every apparatus, especially the rings. The rings are like flying and the definition of control. They were my specialty and my demise.

I spent my early youth competing until I was old enough to go to the Olympics. I was on the USAAG’s radar by the time I was fourteen, but the rules are you can’t compete until you are at least sixteen years of age. Well I competed at sixteen in 2008 winning six gold medals, in 2012 I brought home eight gold medals and one fateful day in 2016 during the first competition of the day, on the rings, I went from a downward facing bowd and into a triple salto pike and on the last turn, well…let’s just say I’ve been rolling since then, which is what makes it so hilarious that they are now attempting to get me to move out of this chair by using a tween.

“Have you been listening to anything I just said?”

“If it were of any importance to my life perhaps I would have been.”

“Wow…” she lifts herself onto the table with perfect poise and crosses her legs and it’s only then I see the hint of a surgical scar on her right knee. We call them zipper scars because they form a straight line with spots peppering the sides where either the staples or the stitches closed the skin afterwards.

I roll forward curious and tempt my luck by trying to lift her skirt up.

“Excuse me!” She hops down slapping my hand away from her knee. “Jak, you didn’t tell me he was handsy!”

“Sorry baby, he only does it for the ladies!” He’s helping the same child, a boy named Danny who has been coming here for nearly as long as I have been, to walk. Danny was born with cerebral palsy, lucky. He may actually walk one day, unlike me. Those days are over and when I am not here I am at home.

“You have a surgical scar on your right knee. I was merely trying to look at it.”

She folds her arms, which perks up her rack.

“What did you say your name was?” I ask her.

“Rin Matthews,” she tells me, clearly annoyed and suddenly my brain is spinning, because as well-known as my story is, so was hers. Emphasis on _was_.

“Has been on ice?” I laugh at my own joke.

“Has been in a wheelchair!” she shoots back at me and I’m surprised she has the balls to do that, if that’s what she is hiding under that skirt.

“I could get you fired for that.”

“Well then it’s good this is just a trial run,” her nose wrinkles again and if looks could kill I would be out of my misery. “You know why you are so upset?”

“Oh, please tell me?” I’ve heard this shit so many times. I’m upset because gymnastics was my world, because my pride was bruised, because my mother is a drunk, because my father left me or simply because I have an over-inflated ego. It’s amazing how much people tell you about yourself without actually asking what’s going on inside.

“You had everything and you lost it. You miss what it feels like to fly through the air, to land on your feet, to feel the wind against your skin. You miss the shout of the crowd as you land that perfect move that no one else can, you miss feeling alive.”

I’m going to kill her, because she is right and that alone shocks me into silence.

When I woke up in the hospital the only person there was my brother. He was more into soccer and played in college on a full scholarship while I chased my Olympic dream. He was half asleep sitting in a chair next to my bed and the first thing he said when I woke up was, “I’m sorry.” He was sorry, sorry for what? But it only took me a few seconds after I envisioned myself swinging my legs over the side of the bed and my legs not moving for me to understand why.

“Why not get that feeling back?”

I wonder if they would put a paraplegic in jail for murder, but before I can contemplate the many ways I would end her life she has the back of my chair and is dragging me over to the parallel bars. “Did you forget the part where I cannot walk?”

“I forgot the part where you didn’t say you miss the burn in your muscles and flying. So come on, I bet you can’t do this.” She goes under the parallel bars and flips her flats off nearly hitting Diana, the teen who had a massive stomach trauma doing sit-ups and lifts herself off the ground, one hand on either bar and then tries to go into a downward bowd but fails miserably, because her form is terrible and obviously she has no upper-body strength. “You’re doing it wrong.”

Her biceps bulge at the weight of her body pressing against them and she can only manage to get her legs out behind her until she looks like a V. “Show me how to do it then.”

“Nice try.”

“Oh, come on,” she hops down and skips across the bars, swinging her legs up until she swings them and wraps them around the outside of the bars and I can see the thong she is wearing, which gets my imagination going and then she leans over me and arches her back like cat, licking her lips that have somehow caught my attention. “I’ll make a deal with you, you lift yourself up and hold it for like two minutes and I’ll show you my scars.”

“How many are there?”

“Three. Come on, Sesshomaru. Let me see it. Or are you just chicken? Bock, bock, bock,” she squawks at me and I want to punch her.

I grit my teeth and put the break down on my wheels. I haven’t touched the parallel bars since the fall. They’re usually 6.5 feet off the ground giving you ample space to twist and turn. My hands remember what it’s like to curl around the wood and for a minute as I lift myself up I think of how to get into a proper bowd. Only I can’t because my legs are dead weight beneath me, but I am out of the chair and the part of my trunk I can control which stops just below my navel is perfectly straight but god, it’s been years since I have done this. Within seconds of lifting myself up my back hurts, and I clench the muscles in my face to stay upright.

“Fifteen seconds Takahashi, you can do it.”

She’s staring at the watch on her wrist and I didn’t even notice how close to me she is standing. Her arms are ready to catch me should I fall, which I might because heaven help me, I have not done this in years and the lines that used to create valleys down my arms aren’t there. “Thirty seconds,” she says as if she is my coach all over again. I grunt because it’s not as easy as it once was and breathing is getting difficult.

“I can’t—”

“That’s a four letter word,” she giggles and sets her palms over my trembling hands. They’re cool against the heat of my skin and I close my eyes focusing on breathing. The first time I tried to learn to do a handstand I fell over and over and once I had it down my coach made me practice it until I had calluses on my palms and my body trembled. “One minute, come on push it.”

My eyes are shut tight and I can feel sweat forming on my forehead. It drips down my nose over my lips and instinctively I lick the droplet, because there is nothing that tastes better than the salt in sweat. “Fuck!” I yell and Danny giggles next to me, my hands lose their grip and before I can crash onto my non-existent working legs Rin has me in a bear hug and sits me back in my chair. “Goddammit!” I remove the brake and wheel myself as quickly as I can for the door.

“Where are you going?” She runs after me and grabs the handles, effectively ending my escape.

“Wheeling myself out.” There is nothing more bitter than defeat, especially when you are used to winning.

“That was pretty good, you got a minute twenty. Come on,” she drags me back unwillingly to that god-awful blue therapy table again and I am certain now that I want to kill her. She lifts herself up onto the table again, back sliding up and legs crossing. She pulls back her skirt and reveals the scar on her knee and it’s so tempting to touch it again but this time she doesn’t stop me as I massage her knee, feeling the rough bumps of the scar. “Where are the other two?”

“On the back,” she says attempting to turn her knee out.

I hurt my knee once but it was able to recover on its own after six months. I was doing a three and a half twist on the vault and came out on my left leg wrong, and ended on my ass instead of my feet. But even pain I cannot feel below my waist. “What are you thinking about? Not every day a guy wants to spend so much time on my scars.”

I stifle a groan but I wonder…if I could hold myself for a minute twenty on the bars, can I lift myself onto the table? My palms find the rough material and to my utter shock and amazement, because the bed goes up to my shoulder I am able to lift my saggy, limp ass and sit next to her. “Did you see the video?” she asks me. “The one where I fell during practice? This fan named Cassie Jenkins was filming for her school news because her dad got her backstage passes. No one was supposed to film the practice event, and what goes up, comes down. It hurt like a bitch.”

“I don’t remember falling if that helps,” I offer. “It took eight surgeries to get me in the condition you see me now.”

“What’s it going to take to get you out of it, Sesshomaru?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean what do you want out of life? If you could have anything, and I don’t mean your life before. With your limitations, if you could do anything, what would it be?”

I close my eyes, my arms are already sore. “To compete again.”

“There are a lot of options for para-athletes.”

I only shake my head, a new sport. I am too old to learn a new sport and what would I be good at? “Well how about this, you come here ready to work and each time we’ll have a competition to see who can last the longest on the bars. Skater, my legs were my strength. I bet in a few weeks you’ll be kicking my ass. Now lay down, let’s get those legs working.”

I’m about to make some comment about how they never will when she tugs on my shoulders and gets me on my back. She starts with trunk twists. “Don’t let your shoulders move cowboy,” she says as she manipulates my legs from a straight position up to my chest and I’m reminded just how much I hate these exercises.

“You’ve got the job,” Bankotsu says as he walks by.

“Yes!” She squeaks dropping one of my legs to flop onto the table and I hiss because of the pain it causes in my lower back. “I’m sorry!”

“I’m never coming back here.”

“I have another forty five minutes to get you to change your mind,” she smiles as my arms flop to the sides. I am not coming back to this place.

* * *

By the end of my appointment, I am sweating and tired. It might seem like nothing when someone else rotates the limbs that you can’t move but somehow this girl has managed to make me do sit ups, both with legs straightened and legs bent and I forgot how bad abs can burn when they haven’t been used in years. I’m laying on the therapy table again, with sweat dripping down my back as I stretch my arms to the sides lifting 15lbs dumbbells on either side while she circles me correcting my form. Every time I bring them up to my head I feel the burn in my chest, the one that used to make me feel like my soul was on fire, like I could do anything.

When I used to compete, I lifted weights five days a week. We can’t make the jumps we do without muscles. It’s why Aly Raisman is as built as she is and Simone Biles has the best jump. Those thick calves and quads are what we need to move and our arms have to be just as strong. Rings are judged based off of control and movement, they are called the Still Rings for a reason, the less you move while on them, the higher the points. I had an eight pack and lines of muscles so deep in my arms I could balance a coin on them. That was before. “Fuck,” I cuss, my palms wet as I drop one of the dumbbells. I could easily do this with fifty pound weights before, I’m lifting like a girl.

“I got it,” she says so cheerfully I want to throw up. I sit up puffing to catch my breath while she sets it next to its pair. “I’m done,” I say crossing my arms and closing my eyes. Inuyasha will be here to rescue me soon, he always comes at three fifty exactly.

“Not yet,” she says. “Go on your stomach.”

“Dear God why?”

“Time to cool down, lay down on your stomach.”

I look at her like she is an idiot. I can’t move my legs, they dangle like useless stalks from my torso down the side of the bed and it’s too narrow for me to roll over like a dog. “You can’t do it?” Her sympathy is embarrassing. She leans down and takes my ankles. “I’ll take care of your ankles, you do your trunk okay?”

I grit my teeth, I really don’t want to do this. “Why?”

“You are going to make everything difficult aren’t you? Well…I figure if I were you and in my experience working with injuries like yours, you probably have pain right before L3 and I was going to massage your back, arms and legs to get the fluid moving so you won’t be so sore tomorrow.”

A free massage? God I hurt, and not just near the area of my injury, but I’m not sure I can handle the humiliation of her manipulating my legs so I don’t fall head first off the table. “Hey Jak?” she calls. Oh please, not him…

“What momma?”

“Can you come over here just in case?” she asks and I am officially humiliated.

“I’m not doing this,” I reach for my chair to get off the damn table and somehow she ducks under my arms stopping me with so much desperation in her eyes that I can’t resist.

“Look, I know it sucks and you are embarrassed and you are so used to being independent but let me do this. I majored in massage too, there are special oil sprays here that will help take the bite away. Please? Let me help you?”

Jakotsu is standing at the head of the bed and even he looks so sympathetic I want to puke, and just when I decide to give this a chance, Inuyasha comes in and I choke back the need to either punch someone or cry. I shake my head because the truth is, I know how sore I am going to be tomorrow, even if it is going to be Saturday and I rest on the weekends. I nod my head allowing her to grasp my ankles and lift them up while Jakotsu supports my chest to help me roll over. “Wow, you’re out of your chair today,” Inuyasha says. He’s dressed in scrubs because after this he has a rotation at the pediatric neuro-ward.

“We got a new worker, this is Rin,” Jakotsu points at her.

“Hands under your chin,” she tells me while she walks up to my back. “Jak, do you have any sprays with peppermint?”

“We got some good ones. Come with me,” they walk away together and I can’t help but notice she has a wonderfully round ass.

“If you say anything,” I warn my brother.

“I think it’s great,” he says pulling a chair up to my head. “She’s cute.”

“I hate her. I’m not coming back next week. You should like that, you won’t miss class any longer to help me.”

“I don’t mind missing class to help you and you know that.”

I want to hate my brother, but when I was injured he was the first one in the hospital. My father had a business meeting he couldn’t get out of and my mother, let’s just say one of the reasons they divorced was her incredible ability to be drunk almost 24/7, although much to my internal shock, she is easier to live with than dear old Dad. It’s obvious she mourns who I was, but she doesn’t ask me to be something I’m not.

Inuyasha changed majors after my injury with the goal of being a neurosurgeon. He’s a second year med-student and his college has given him special permission to miss an hour of clinicals he makes up on days off to help me five days a week when he should be spending more time with his wife and son. Kieran was born just before he was accepted to Denver Medical.

Before I realize it, she is back and she has her fingers curled around the back of my shirt. They’re cool against my skin as she says, “I can do it over the shirt, is it okay if I massage the oils into your back?”

“Go ahead,” I mutter, defeated.

“Can I ask you something?” she says and I detect nerves in her voice as she lifts the back of my shirt, but then I feel her fingers spread and slide down the many scars on my back.

“I’m leaving in five minutes, make it fast.” Her palm comes back down on my back in circular motions and grip the top of the bed because it hurts.

“Where do you hurt the most? I’ll start from the top of the back and you tell me.” But then her palm presses just above the tailbone, “there,” I pant out and I’m fairly certain I have ripped the cover of the bed. Bone pain is the worst. My back has never fully healed and I don’t believe that physical therapy ever works, I always ended in more pain than before.

“It’s tense. So to be honest it would be better if I put more pressure in, are you comfortable with me lowering your pants a bit?”

Inuyasha stands up and comes over to see what she is doing. “Why would more pressure work?”

“Well the muscles here and here,” she touches the upper portion of my lower trunk where I still can feel sensation, “they overcompensate for what his legs and glutes can’t do. See if you touch here, you can feel some swelling.”

I grunt and bite down when she touches the area, pain is an understatement. “Fuck, I am not your damn guinea pig!”

“Sorry,” her hands jump off me.

“Sesshomaru, she’s trying to help you.”

“Pathetic.”

“Well if you let me finish being pathetic, can I take these down a bit?”

“Whatever,” I roll my eyes.

She jimmies my pants down a bit, but I can’t feel what she is doing, until her hands come back up and massage the skin that can feel. It hurts, but as the pain rolls over me, relief comes quickly. She repeats the motions of kneading my muscles up my back, so slowly there is something sensuous about it. When she reaches my shoulder I sigh, moving my neck to the side to let her dig her hands in. She continues down both my arms, spraying my skin with her bottle that smells like mint and then she sits down in front of me, working on my biceps. It’s only then I’ve had a chance to really look at her. Her eyes are almond shaped, and her nose is small. Her cheeks are peppered with freckles and when she smiles, dimples crease her cheeks. “Why didn’t you try to compete again, after your leg healed?”

She lowers her eyes as she changes to my other bicep and I swear I start floating to heaven, but then I notice her sucking on her bottom lip.

“Huh,” I raise an eyebrow, “you were scared.”

“I was not.”

“Then what was it?”

“Would you have?”

“You mean if my injury wasn’t worse than yours? Because I have an actual excuse?” Then it dawns on me that although she’s like me, she’s nothing like me at all. She knows what an Olympic dream tastes like but, “you copped out.”

“I did not,” she says with so much indignation.

“Did you even try?”

“God Sesshomaru, she’s trying to help you,” I hear Inuyasha from behind me.

“You think because you qualified and failed that you and I have something in common and therefore I will stop being the way that I am—"

Her face changes from pink to red and then the blessed tears peek at the corner of her eyes.

“I am nothing like you.”

“Next time, if you wear shorts, I can work on your legs. It will help your circulation.” The words come out quietly and she turns on her heels running for the back office while I gloat.

“You are one evil mother fucker,” Inuyasha grabs my arm and helps to haul me up. “Come on big guy, so is she your new PT? And that’s how you treat her?”

“She deserved no better,” I snarl out, if my luck holds out she’ll quit. I do feel better though, I glance over my shoulder and she is in the office with Jakotsu holding her in a tight hug. I win. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH COMMENT AND KUDO PLEASE!!!!


	3. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin gets the job at Band of Seven and tells her old Coach Kaede. Can Kaede convince her to lace up again?

**Rin**

“Oh baby don’t let that asshole under your skin,” Jakotsu says as he holds me in a tight bearhug and I try to get my emotions in check. Is he right? They say it takes four to six weeks for a broken knee to heal but it takes a lot longer than that for the pain to subside and even longer if there are complications which there were. I spent a year in physical therapy before I went to the rink again and laced my skates up.

Kohaku took me and I begged him to get on the ice with me although it really wasn’t his thing. I laced my shoes up, got as far as the lip of the rink and then froze worse than a deer with headlights. He said it took him several minutes of calling my name before I came to and by the time he did, my heart was racing, my palms were sweaty and I thought I was going to pass out. I told Kaede, my coach and Sango my big sister that was it, I was not skating again and I thought it was best to focus on school. I already had a GED, all that was left was applying to colleges.

“Maybe he’s right Jak,” I say trying to wipe my eyes of the tears. “What if I did? I didn’t even try again. I haven’t been on the ice in ten years.”

“Honey you’ve heard the term misery loves company right?” Jakotsu pushes me back and his fingers brush under my eyes, slopping the tears off my cheeks. “Sesshomaru Takahashi is just miserable. He lives at home with his mother, doesn’t drive, doesn’t even take public transportation, no job and his favorite thing to do is come here and give us hell. He’s made three other women quit and I swear his MO is how to get under everyone’s skin. You got the job honey! You’re home free! Fuck him!”

His words hit me and I suddenly feel better, because he’s right. It doesn’t matter that I didn’t skate again, I’ve still made something of myself and I didn’t sit and wallow like he is. I slap my cheeks to get the color back in them and Jak takes me back to meet with Bankotsu.

* * *

��

“You can have him,” Suikotsu says to me as Bankotsu takes me back into his office. “We got him six months after the original injury. He’s made it that much harder on himself by refusing to do any of the therapies. He has constant complaints of lower back soreness, bed sores and UTI’s.”

“Can you tell me more about his injury?” I remember hearing about it but I didn’t actually look into it.

“Well, the main thing is that no one knows what happened. He went up to dismount, then came down hard on his tail bone. L3 and L4 took the biggest hits,” Suikotsu pulls up pictures of an x-ray on his computer. “Originally the swelling was higher, he couldn’t feel from his chest down and it affected his organs but once the swelling went down they narrowed the injury to between L3 and L4.” He points at the fractures along the spinal column. “His nerves were damaged and—”

“Nerve replacement surgery?” My ex told me all about it, he even got to assist on it once.

“There are only eleven cases where that has worked,” Bankotsu says leaning back in his chair. “We don’t sell false hopes here. Just reality.”

My stomach pitches, because I know I’ve overstepped and I wonder if they will still offer me the position. “I can respect that. So tell me about his function? Bladder control? Sensations? Movement?”

Bankotsu gives me the computer and Suikotsu starts to fill me in, “he has decent bladder and sphincter control. He experiences no feeling below L3. His brother tells me he has intense pain in his lower back. I honestly have never seen him work like he did today. You did a good job with him, but next time you swing your legs on the parallel bars, try not to wear a lacy thong.”

I turn bright red and cover my face. “I’m sorry, these are like interview clothes, not what I normally wear. I’m guessing he struggles with depression too?”

“Yep and his ego, all stop him from learning to care for himself and compensate for his disability. He lives with his mother who has issues with alcohol and nicotine abuse from what his brother has told us, he is estranged from his father,” Bankotsu speaks unemotionally and I know that voice, he has a business to run, it’s not his job to fix the broken patients.

“But the brother brings him here?” I ask for confirmation.

“Yep and picks him up. He has not learned to drive in his current state,” Bankotsu adds.

“Poor guy,” I say and sit down. Even though he was a dick, there is a part of me that feels for him. He really is just miserable, which means I will make it my job to make sure that he actually starts seeing those rays of sunshine. I bet he hasn’t since competition, I bet he misses warming up and shooting the breeze with the other gymnasts, I know I do. Warming up was the best part, we all got to skate together to get the blood flowing in our legs. We would small talk, trash talk with the rivals with big egos but mostly just have fun together. One time I got us all playing tag to get moving.

That’s it, my new life’s mission is going to be to get Sesshomaru Takahashi to start moving again.

“Well, I know this was just a test but can I keep him? He responded to me and I would like to help him.”

“You can have him. We have a generous benefits package and the starting pay is $60,000 a year does that work for you?” Bankotsu asks me.

“Yes it does!” I say excitedly standing up. “I need two weeks to give notice at my other job if that’s okay?”

“We need a two weeks to do the background checks and then you can start.”

* * *

I literally skip out of the office down the street. The Band of Seven Rehabilitation Center is within walking distance of my house. When I get home I run for Kohaku’s room only to hear moaning on the other side of the door and roll my eyes. Last night it was some chick named Carrie and today? I just don’t know, which is how I end up back outside and heading to catch a bus that will take me to Kaede’s rink. She still teaches young and impressionable skaters.

I go in during an open skate to see her standing on the ice, wearing a big parka. She never really did like the cold but she loved skating. “Rin!” she calls me with a big smile that crinkles her aging face. She has one good eye and one she keeps covered. She told me that it was because when she was a girl she was in an accident but let me tell you, that one good eye can pick up on the slightest imbalance in a jump, if the toe pick is slightly bent the wrong direction, or if your ankle went out too far in a lutz.

“Hey!” I skip up to her, giving her a giant hug.

“I haven’t see you here in years!” She motions me down to the bleachers and we watch her skaters. “It’s just warm up time now.”

“I got a job at Band of Seven today.”

“That’s wonderful!”

“I’m starting in two weeks. I also got an interesting patient assigned to me. Sesshomaru Takahashi.”

“Sesshomaru Takahashi,” she says quietly and I know she recognizes his name. Talk about the broken back that was heard around the world. “Leah, turn your ankle! It should feel natural!” The girl goes up and comes down into toe loop. “What brings you here? Not just to tell an old woman about the job.”

“He was an ass…” and I immediately feel guilty. “But then he said something that made me kind of think was true. Did I cop out? After I blew my knee out?”

“It was a bad injury,” she says, and it all comes back to me watching the girls skate. I was skating to a “Time for US”, a romantic Romeo and Juliet song. My opening jump was a quad toe, triple toe, triple loop. It took some amazing leg power and I was only the female in figure skating that could do it. I went up and down on the quad and felt my knee twinge, went up for the triple toe and it pinched, by the time I did the next jump it snapped, and I still remember what that snap of sinews sounded like. I landed on my ass screaming and didn’t stop until I was sedated and prepped for surgery. “But I thought once it healed you would try again.”

“I did, I made it as far as the lip of the ice-rink and was terrified.”

She shakes her head. “You always had an ego on you because you were so good. You thought you were invincible. Knee injuries hurt, but what was hurt more? The knee or your pride?”

I close my eyes thinking of how devastated I was. I had busted my ass to get to the Olympics and fell in practice. PRACTICE, not even during competition. They said the gold was mine, nothing could stand in my way. “Pride.”

She only chuckles with me and then says, “Are you still a size 7.5?”

“Yeah why?”

“We’re going to lace up,” she gets up and I swear I can hear her bones creaking. “Wait here.” She hobbles to the back of the shop where she works and comes back with a brand new pair of skates.

“I can’t afford those!” I tell her shaking my head. “And God is this going to hurt.” Everyone knows breaking in a new pair of skates fucks your feet up.

“Try them on and go have some fun. First class is free and these are a gift for your new job.”

“Kaede,” I want to refuse them but my fingers wrap around the leather and I remember I felt like I was flying when I skated. I kick off my flats and lace up the new skates. “What if I fall?”

“Your butt will be sore, it will grow back. Go on,” she tells me and stands up leaning against the glass separating the ice. I walk rigidly out to the rink and throw my blazer to the side. My palms sweat, but as I watch one girl drop into a sit spin and another girl throw her first double it brings back all my happy memories.

The sound system is playing, “Impossible” by Shante and I imagine while I take that first step onto the ice how impossible this felt ten years ago. My hands start sweating almost the second my toe pick dips into the first inch of ice and I hold my chest thinking about the back wall where I fell and wasn’t able to get up.

“Ice isn’t going to bite you,” I hear a voice from my behind me.

“Kohaku,” I say as I grip the retaining wall and turn around. “What are you doing here? How did you know I was here?”

“Find my iphone,” he holds up his iphone, pointing to my location. “You didn’t come home after your interview and you weren’t answering your phone calls. I got worried. So I phone-stalked you.”

“As you can see, I’m fine,” I say staring at the ice like it’s my enemy. “Why is this so hard?”

“Because it hurt like hell,” he jumps off the bleachers and I see he has a pair of skates flopped over his shoulder. “I have about an hour before I need to head to work.” He sits down, laces up, then walks over to the ice and holds out his hand. “Come on baby sis, let’s fly.”

I take his hand and we soar. We take it slow skating forward holding hands but as the music picks up, I pick up speed and he goes with me twisting in circles around me. Then he pivots backwards and I follow along. It’s as if I never left the ice. I’m going to be so sore in the morning.

When we were kids, Kohaku and I used to dance on the ice together and if Sango was with us, we’d play freeze tag. This time he grabs me around the waist and hauls me into the air spinning in a circle while I giggle and I finally realize that although I haven’t set foot on the ice in ten years, he has because he still has poise and control, he was just never any good at it.

* * *

��

My mom brought us both to the ice for the first time when I was six and he was nine. They say bad luck comes in threes, my Dad ran out on us, my aunt Rina got sick with breast cancer and then she died. Mom took Kohaku and Sango in as her own and thought what better way to distract us then stick us in a sport? Sango was already fourteen and a blade master in fencing. She had been competing and even had sponsors but I was just six and to make it easier to not think about my dad, she put me and Kohaku on the ice. At first we did junior pairs together but by the time I was nine, Kaede recognized my natural talent and pushed me to do singles.

Kohaku was more into music by then and wanted instruments instead of skating lessons. But me, I could land anything that they threw at me. I soared on the ice like a bird and I was so flexible I could do the donut spin. I choked on my first competition and face planted, when I looked up to find my mom in a crowd she was holding a big yellow sign with rhinestones that said, “Live your dream, don’t dream your life.” I got up and kicked ass. When I placed tenth, she told there was always next time and next time I was even better.

I was doing triples by the time I was twelve and threw my first quad when I was fourteen in junior competition. Girls don’t do quads, boys do. I was that good.

But all good things they say come to an end, mom got sick with cancer when I was twelve and passed away, the same damn cancer that killed my aunt too. Sango was twenty at the time and I didn’t know that mom had a will and an insurance plan throughout the duration of her sickness. On her deathbed she made me promise I would keep skating, because whatever I did down here she would be doing up there and it would be like we were skating together. Sango was already seriously dating Miroku and together they decided to get married young and adopt Kohaku and I.

I used all the pain of my mother’s death to skate. I soared through amateurs, landing jumps that no one else could. Most people stuck with the doubles and sometimes triples but when I saw Alexei Yagudin and Evegeny Plushenko land triple combos and giant quads I knew that is what I wanted to do. I told Kaede and she thought I was insane at first but then she promised me if I worked hard, I could do it too.

And I did, but mom, she would be even more proud of me now.

* * *

���

For fun just before Kohaku leaves I set myself up to jump a single toe loop, nothing ambitious and land, twisting my ankle, falling on my side laughing. He slides up next to me holding out his hand and says, “so you got the job?”

“I got it. They’re paying me triple what you make at the coffee shop.” I get up. “I was going to give me two weeks today.”

“Great,” he laughs holding my hand as we skate off the ice. “When are you buying us a car.”

“Us?”

“Yeah us.”

“When you can afford half the payments, the gas and insurance Hak.” I elbow him and Kaede is watching the skaters with a smile that wrinkles her whole face.

“Come back in the morning Rin,” Kaede says to me as I flex my sore feet. “I have an open skate that starts at 6am.”

“I’ll be there,” I say excited, my legs burn and I’m covered in sweat, but I feel amazing. It’ll keep me entertained until I start working with the Ice King in two weeks, because that will be my biggest challenge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudo and comment please!!


	4. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru returns to physical therapy, but Rin isn't there.
> 
> I passed my finals!! I am so excited ya'll thank you for being patient while I get these stories up!

**Sesshomaru**

I lead a rather boring life. Of course, you would too if you were in my position. My day starts with wrangling myself out of bed and into my chair. Most days I go out into the garden that attaches to my room to escape the stink of smoke from the rest of the house. It’s winter and in Denver, it chills your bones. I can feel the ache in my back before a bad snow comes and as I look up at the grey clouds, I know that’s exactly what’s coming.

Father said the backyard was a waste of money. It’s also the last place I saw him. We haven’t spoken in four years except for family dinners on Christmas when he tries to avoid the obvious disappointment I am to him. I had asked him for the thirty thousand to make this my haven out of desperation a year after I broke my back. The doctors thought it was a good idea, tending a garden to keep my mind off the obvious depression brewing in my mind like a cyclone. He thought I should have gone to college and gotten a degree, joined him in the business world. He’s a real-estate lawyer and I swear the reason he and my mother divorced had little to do with irreconcilable differences as it did with him being married to his work and her being married to her bottle.

At four they used to share their time until Mother put me in gymkhana, and let’s just say the rest is history. I could do basic handstands by the age of five, I was on the pommel horse at six and started learning the parallel bars at seven. When dad figured out that I was spending all my time at the gym, he and mom got into a giant fight about my future. All I wanted to do was backflips, cartwheels and somersaults and he wanted me learning quadratic equations. Guess which one I did.

Either way, I managed to weasel the money out of him saying it was for therapy that would help me see the error of my ways and instead used it to create this garden. The sidewalk was paved wide to accommodate my wheelchair and the garden was raised so I don’t have to bend over to reach the beds. I started a pumpkin patch last year that has grown nicely. Over the summer I added acorn and butternut squash.

Against the back, vines of roses lattice their way through the metal chain link fence of my yard. In the spring and summer they bloom in yellows, red and white. Then there is the apple tree that I had transplanted. She struggles in the winter with the cold but with enough tender care, I’ve seen her through three winters. She’s my first stop as I roll through my garden checking my plants. Her trunk is sturdier than it was when I first had her brought and her branches bend in the summer with the weight of the fruit. I use tarps to keep the soil around her covered and protected from the frigid cold.

After that, my other stops are to the beds of herbs I use for cooking. I turned the soil down two weeks before the temperatures dropped. They’re empty boxes of soil now. “I thought I would find you out here,” mother says with a smoke in her mouth. I can’t help but notice the bottle that hangs off her other hand like a dangling neck.

“Mother,” I say tersely because this is supposed to be my private garden. “What are you doing here?”

“I made breakfast,” she tells me with a glint in her eyes.

“Really?” And I wonder if it’s burnt, or even edible, because mother doesn’t cook, she drinks.

“Pancakes, with chocolate chips.” You would think she was a debutante the way she dresses in frilly blacks and whites. The truth is, this is my house and I allow her to live with me because she is cheaper than a nurse and far less judgmental. She allows me to live my life as I see fit and so I allow her to do the same. She teaches English to children at night, because it’s easier than having to leave the house and even drunk she makes a decent educator. But of course I am sure she has forgotten I am twenty-eight, not twelve, and my stomach doesn’t tolerate pancakes well.

I decide to follow her into the house after making a pit-stop to cath myself before I wait any longer and end with an accident. One of the many skills I’ve learned is that I can train my body to go when I want it to, which minimizes the embarrassment of accidents, something else dear old Dad couldn’t handle.

She’s actually managed to make flap-jacks and to avoid disappointing her, I sit and eat them with her.

* * *

�  Kagome, Inuyasha’s wife, comes to pick me up at twelve thirty just after she gets her son from his playgroup. Kieran usually has a million things to tell me and the only ones that are intelligible are about the poop in his diaper and what he ate at school. I spend the afternoon eating lunch with them while Kagome studies for school. She is finishing her nursing degree, whereas Inuyasha is in med school. Their apartment is rather small and quaint. Even Inuyasha avoids taking money from dear old Dad who would have preferred, again, that he go into business. Because of me, he chose medicine. He doesn’t say it, but I know that he wants to find a cure to my paralysis.

Kieran leaps into my lap and we go for a ride around the living room while he laughs, saying superman over and over. In return for me keeping him entertained while she studies, I am rewarded with a lunch that is actually worth eating, meat sandwiches, sometimes steaks and usually a medley of vegetables from my garden. This child has our silver hair and freckles and his favorite thing to do is pretend to be a dog.

Inuyasha comes home promptly around 2:30 to take me to the Band of Seven. I know he does this because left to my own devices I wouldn’t go. I know enough to take care of myself, and my legs aren’t going to get any less paralyzed, so I have yet to see the benefit of five days a week, 52 weeks a year, but he insists, and I do get sick pleasure out of tormenting their staff.

This time as he wheels me in exactly at three o’clock, instead of the adorable candy-striper waiting for me, Dr. Suikotsu is there patting the table. I swear I might hurl. “I suppose I scared her off?”

“Not at all, she starts in two weeks,” he says with a glint of humor in his eyes.

“And I thought I made her cry.” I wave off my brother who goes to study while I exercise.

“Any new areas of pain?”

“I’m looking at it,” I say as I stare him down.

“Well, shall we get started?” he says, and there is nothing I love more than breaking the hopeful.

This is usually where the banter begins, but instead, to my utter shock, I start stretching out my arms, eyes on the parallel bars again. They aren’t the rings, but they’ll do. Over the weekend my biceps and wrists burned from strain and even mother noticed that I seemed ‘happier’ than usual. “Those,” I point at them, rolling myself over to the bars. “Go away, Danny.”

“You’re such an ass,” he tells me, and I almost balk because he is eight years old and shouldn’t be talking like that. “Wanna have a competition?”

Wouldn’t I love to compete again, but my opponent is a three foot nine inch little upstart with three missing teeth. He lifts himself up and swings his legs back and forth and I know he’s actually doing more to tire his arms out doing that, because real poise comes from how long you can dangle. I grasp the bars and lift myself straight up out of my chair, ignoring the dead weight in my legs. “Last time I did a minute and twenty seconds.”

“Yeah, I did two minutes, let’s go, gimpy,” Danny sticks his tongue out at me. “If I win, you owe me chocolate.”

“If I win you owe me a bottle of scotch.” My arms start shaking after fifteen seconds and my palms cover in sweat. God, this feels good. After thirty seconds the burn is coming back, but I walk myself lightly on the palms of my hands to get a better grip while Danny starts swinging his legs back and forth.

“You’re gonna lose, you’re gonna lose!” he gloats, and I swear if I could kick my legs, I don’t care that he’s a child, I would rack him.

“Bring it, midget,” I grit my teeth to keep from falling.

“One minute,” Suikotsu says standing over us with a timer.

“Oooh, he’s gonna kick your ass, Takahashi,” Jakotsu says. “Baby, you beat him I’ll buy you chocolate.”

My hands start trembling, my shoulders feel like they are on fire, but I will not be shown up by an ankle biter with missing teeth. I am an Olympic gold medalist, I have medals older than this little shit, and that is all I am thinking of when I plummet while Danny giggles still kicking his legs back and forth. The good doctor catches me before I hit the ground. I knew I hated that girl. “When does she start?” I ask Suikotsu.

“Two weeks from today.”

“I want her to be my physical therapist.”

I’ll show her…after I buy this damn kid some chocolate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment and Kudo you all know I love it!


	5. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin starts her first day at the Band of Seven but Sesshomaru has a little mishap.

**Rin**

**Two weeks later**

It snowed. It finally snowed today and not just your little snow, a big one. We got hit with eight inches, which isn’t enough to shut the city down, but the sidewalks are icy as I walk to my first day of work. The sidewalks are a disaster, which is fairly normal for this time of year. I have my mantra ready and I know I’m going to do good today.

I stop at Starbucks and Kohaku is already there, so is my best friend Shippo. Shippo skated until he was thirteen then dropped out and lived the normal life.

“Hey sis!” Kohaku calls me as he whips up my favorite drink. I’m simple and plain, he tells me as he makes my vanilla latte.

I slide over and ask him how his morning was and could he please stop entertaining so late. “Fine,” Kohaku waves me off. “Listen, your doctor called the house line, you have an appointment at one thirty.”

“What? It’s my first day I can’t go!” I yell at him. “Which one?”

He comes around the corner and says quietly, “remember you said you would go see the specialist and get tested for the BRCA gene? Both our moms got sick in their forties so they just want to test you and Sango for it. You should go, you know how hard it is to get into that office.” He knows because he has been in that office too.

“Great,” I say rubbing my forehead. “Fine, just please, no more girls this week?”

“Hey they follow me.”

“And you don’t have to rise to the occasion!” I shout over the line of customers.

“Did it take you all day to think of that one?” A hand slinks around my shoulders and I jump seeing Jak behind me.

“Jak,” I hold my heart breathing. “How bad will Ban hate me if I have to run out for a doctor’s appointment on my first day. I forgot and it’s really important and I have to get in.”

“I’ll cover for you, just get back in time to work with Puddles, bitch has been making us crazy for the two weeks,” he says and links an arm through mine. “Mother fucker wanted a damn massage and when Suikotsu did it, _it hurt too much_. At least his ass got out of that chair. He went to the bars first every day the last two weeks. I think he wants to show you who the boss is.”

* * *

The day starts with me getting the charts of patients that will be mine. We go over their injuries and their goals and then get to work. I still have more questions about Sesshomaru though, “does he have bedsores?”

“Regularly,” Suikotsu tells me in the breakroom.

“Ouch,” I say gritting my teeth, it’s what happens when someone is left in the same position for too long. “Does he have any goals?”

“If you can get him to make any,” he says drinking a thick cup of coffee. “He does what he wants when he comes in. As far as I know he’s done the bare minimum to be marginally self-sufficient. Why the fascination with him?”

I go through my other charts on the computer and purse my lips, “truth? Most of these clients will be in and out, I mean a few we’ll see long term but they seem like they have been cooperating with therapy but him? Four years and minimal progress? Why does he keep coming if he doesn’t want to be here?”

“His brother,” he answers me sitting on the table. “Inuyasha shuttles him to and from in the hopes we can get him to do more. It’s the fact that he is like you in a way isn’t it?”

“That too…” I go to the coffee machine, our break is almost over. “I know what it feels like, to some degree to be there and then not. Maybe I can reach him.” At least this time I am dressed in colorful scrubs, I won’t be flashing my undies for anyone, which is good because it’s a hello kitty thong today. There are other things I want to know about his chart though so I earmark it for later. “How did he fall again?”

“You can find the video online, but the basic gist we got from it is that he was dismounting the rings, with the goal of doing a triple pike. The first two rotations went smoothly but something happened on the third, he went limp and landed back first on the mats in a V position.”

“Putting the brunt of the impact on his lumbar.” I rub my forehead. That is a bad injury. “Well…maybe I can help.”

“And if you can’t, that’s okay too. He has been more active the last two weeks, I think you’ll be surprised,” he says as he leads me back out. Our next patient is a quadriplegic. That means they are paralyzed from the neck down. For patients like this we focus on comfort. Massage to keep the vessels stimulated, we move the extremities to keep them from developing bed sores from being in one position for too long.

* * *

The good thing about working in the medical industry is that we all know how hard some offices are to get into. BRCA is a breast cancer gene and happens to be the one that took my aunt and my mother. Sango got tested two weeks ago, Kohaku can’t afford it even after the insurance paid for some, and neither can I but I’m going anyway. I run out of the office at one to catch a bus to the office in the hopes that it will go quickly. By the time I’m finished and my blood is drawn it’s two-thirty and the bus-ride is going to make it so that I’m nearly late to work with Sesshomaru.

As soon as the bus stops two blocks from the center, I fly off, not paying attention to what I’m doing, until I slip on a patch of ice on the sidewalk, run head first into something warm and then land directly on my ass in a puddle of muddy snow on the side of the road. My leg is killing me and I’m fairly certain my knee is bleeding by the time I pull myself up. “I see why you left the ice now. I believe it won this round.”

“What the fuck is your problem, asshole!” I yell at the owner of the voice, before I see who it is, but just as I try to set my foot down on the cement, I nearly buckle from the pain. “Dammit.” I hold myself up on the street sign, soaking wet in fifteen degree weather. My gloves are soaked, my legs are chilled and I finally connect with a man wearing a blue short puffer coat with a brown ski cap, gold eyes and silver hair. “I’m sorry, Sesshomaru.”

His coffee is on the ground next to his wheels and he is staring at me like I’m the devil. “A little late for that.” He rolls those golden eyes that are so unique. “Aren’t you supposed to be working?”

I test my ankle again and hiss at the pain. It hurts less but there is a hole in my pant knee now that looks decidedly red. I finger it open in scissor motions and hobble over to the freezing cold metal bench to sit down. The wind whips around us, going straight through my wet coat. “Aren’t you supposed to be going to the Center?” I ask him, wondering why he is watching me.

“I was going, when some pathetic female flew into my lap and wasted my coffee. Give me your ankle.” He rolls in front of me and lifts up my leg, manipulating my ankle in circles that make me cringe but even I can tell nothing is broken or sprained. “I think you’ll live. You look terrible though.” He tugs on my hair that is covered in mud and then wipes his hands on his wheels.

Why does he have to gloat?

For reasons beyond me, maybe it was talking about my mother’s demise with the doctor, or the fact that I would give anything right now to have another cup of hot cocoa with marshmallows with her or that I’m covered in mud my first day of my real job, that I burst into tears covering my eyes. 

* * *

Every day after practice, she always made me her own recipe. The first time was after I took a bad spill trying to do a double for the first time. Every athlete's worst nightmare is getting hurt. I twisted my ankle doing a double toe loop. Kaede said it happened to everyone but I thought it happened to me because I deserved it or because I just plain sucked. I wanted it to come easily to me and it didn’t, not like everything before. So momma decided to cheer me up with hot cocoa and suddenly I realize I am blithering like an idiot because it’s my first day and I am soaking wet, I’m cold, my hands feel numb and Satan himself is sitting in front of me and takes my hands in his, closing his palms around mine. “This seems like an overreaction,” he says quietly while rubbing his gloved hands against mine. “Would you like to come back to my brother’s house? He lives three blocks down,” he points at some white apartments down a long street. “We’ll get you cleaned up.”

“Let me call Jak,” I say, lifting up my phone. “Jak,” I start to sob.

_Oh baby what happened?_

“I slipped on some ice and fell in a puddle of mud and now I’m a wreck.” God my nose is running and I feel like I could sob forever now. Somehow the mud made it through my coat to my scrubs underneath and there are literal clumps of mud in my hair.

_I wanna see proof of that._

“Why?”

_Because I wanna gloat, answer your facetime._ I click it on and Jak starts laughing hysterically. _You look like a big-foot finger painted on you. Did you bring a change of clothes? Hey Suikotsu! Rin went ice-skating and puddle jumping and lost. She’s gonna be late._

_Okay!_ I hear him in the background.

“It’s my first day Jak!”

_Puddles is coming in soon._ And suddenly I am all too aware that Puddles is sitting right next to me and his jaw sets most dangerously and his eyes flame at that name. “Jak,” I mouth an _I’m sorry_ to Sesshomaru who is crossing his arms glaring at me. “I’ll be in by three-thirty. I just need to change out of these clothes. Please?”

_I’ll cover for you but don’t make it a habit!_

Suddenly Sesshomaru grabs my phone out of my hand. “Jakotsu, Puddles will be late today and if you ever call me that again.”

_Right…how unprofessional of me._ He hangs the phone up quickly.

I’m still shivering and trying to wipe my eyes. “Okay,” I say and try to stand up only to sit back down, because my knee aches and so does my ankle. “Son of a bitch, my knee hurts.”

He leans over and opens the fabric, examining the cut on my knee. “It’s deep.” He pats his lap and all of a sudden I am sure that I’m dreaming.

“You want me to sit on your lap?”

“How else were you planning on getting off that bench?”

“Great,” I mutter and lift myself off the bench, avoiding the leg that hurts and slide onto his lap. I turn so my back is in his chest and my legs are crossed over his and then I burst into tears again.

“Oh please, it’s a cut and a sore ankle, surely it doesn’t merit this _pity party_ ,” he put emphasis on the last two words. “And you call me Puddles.”

“I didn’t call you puddles,” I blither. “It’s not that.”

“Then pray tell, what is it? Did your cat run off? Your boyfriend broke up with you? Oh I know, your mother died and it was tragic.” 

I clamp my mouth shut as I continue to shiver, trying to get warm. We stop at a traffic light and I feel his hands on my head securing his hat over my muddy hair and then he unzips his coat and pulls me against his chest just as the light changes and he propels us across the street. “My mom died when I was twelve, breast cancer. I just went to get tested for the gene.” I wipe my eyes, trying to get control of myself. “I just miss her sometimes.”

“I’m sorry,” he says rather soberly and then pulls me back against his chest. He’s wearing a black cashmere sweater and I can feel his muscles flexing through the warm material. “Put your arms around my waist. I can’t propel myself and hold onto you at the same time.”

“It’s so cold.” I say as I wrap my around him.

“I feel like I’m carrying an icicle.”

As we get to the next light I feel his arms wrap around my shoulders and rub them, bringing some warmth back into my soaked body. He is amazingly hot under that coat and my hands finally start to thaw out around his back.

We get to the apartment, he presses the handicap button and it occurs to me how much I take for granted. I can open the door and walk in, whereas he has to wait until it opens to wheel inside. He goes to the elevator and I bury my face into his neck and the tears have at last stopped. My hands are finally warm, threaded through the back of his coat. I flex my knee as the elevator rises and twirl my ankle in a circle sighing at the lack of pain I feel. “I can walk now,” I say, quietly trying to get off his lap but he starts rolling before I have a chance.

He and his brother must be close, because he has a key and as soon as I get inside Inuyasha is there and so is someone else. “Kagome meet Rin, my new Physical Therapist and klutz.” He pushes me off his lap and I nearly fall on my ass again.

“Sorry,” I apologize and say, “hi,” to Kagome.

“You look like hell. Come with me,” she invites me back into her room. “There’s a shower in here and let me see if we can find something to fit you. You can throw the dirty clothes into the hall.”

“Hey, let me look at that knee first,” Inuyasha says, following us to the back room. I throw my wet coat off and kick my boots off still feeling tender. He sits me down on the bed and rolls my scrub pants up. “Ooh, this looks deep. It doesn’t need stitches but wash it carefully after you clean up and we’ll put some butterfly bandaids on it.”

“Thanks,” I smile as he leaves.

“You’re working with my brother in law then?” Kagome asks me.

I start peeling off my layers as she leads me back to the bathroom and shows me where everything is. “You know he’s actually made three people quit.”

“I read his file,” I say carefully to protect his privacy. Even though they are related, I can’t tell her anything.

“He was always an egotistical jerk, like the sun shined out of his ass because he was so good at what he did. I knew him before, when he could walk. Inuyasha and I started dating in high school. Back then Sesshomaru was the star of the family, even though Inuyasha was damn good at sports too. But Sesshomaru already had two Olympic competitions under his belt. When, oh god I’m sorry,” she says and I know that look well. Injuries like his, they affect everyone, not just the one that got hurt. “When it happened, we had just gotten married, like literally just weeks before and his mom and dad were out of town. So Inuyasha flew on a red-eye to Rio de Janeiro and he was intubated, with tubes sticking out everywhere. He couldn’t move his legs, couldn’t breathe on his own.” I reach out to hug her. “It killed Inuyasha seeing him like that. It was…the worst…the worst day of our lives. It’s why Inuyasha wants to be a neurosurgeon and why he comes here. He eats lunch with us and then Yash takes him to therapy.”

I know how hard it can be. My first patient was a fifteen year old who thought it would be a good idea to go swimming in the Colorado River. The currents sucked him under and he bashed his neck against a boulder in the water and that broke C2 and that was it. He was paralyzed for the rest of his life. His parents were distraught for a good year until Kagura sat them down and helped them focus on the one who was hurt and connect with others who had experienced what they did. _Everyone needs therapy when stuff like this happens._ “Is he seeing a regular therapist?” I mean someone to deal with his depression and obvious anger with the world.

“He refuses. He’s just so angry, I don’t know. He plays with Kieran, our son but that’s it. He lives with his mom, he doesn’t work, doesn’t drive. He doesn’t really do anything.”

“Like he’s dead inside.”

“Yeah…I mean, did you see when he was active?”

“No but I know what that fire feels like.”

“He was amazing. I mean the still rings were his thing. There were moves named after him. He was the only man that could land triple dismounts without an extra hop for balance and when they want still. He was still, ripped…please? Can you help him?”

I sigh, it’s not really my job to help him like that, but I know what she means, help him find purpose again. “I’ll do my best.”

“I’ll let you get cleaned up. Thanks for listening to me.”

“Sure,” and I close the door and hop in the shower and pray that I am not going to lose my job.

When I come out, she has some new scrubs for me that aren’t my size but will work just fine. I find Sesshomaru in the dining room with a child on his lap giving him a ride as if the boy is superman. Inuyasha examines my knee again and with a few butterfly strips, I’m good to go. “Thanks again,” I say as I head to the door. “You coming?” I ask Sesshomaru.

He exhales. “I believe I will beat you on the bars today.” He grabs his coat and throws one at me, that is too big. I put his hat back on. “Any chance I can get a ride back?” I ask him with a smirk and then jump out of the way because his hand comes dangerously close to my ass. “You are such a pervert!” I yell as we walk out of the apartment. 

* * *

I gave up two minutes ago. Somehow, this dude has gone from barely holding on one week, to two weeks later dangling from the bars for five minutes. I made it two before I quit. “Come on Takahashi!” We were late for his appointment but I don’t care. I’ll give him his hour anyway. “How long did he do last time?” I ask Suikotsu.

“Five minutes and thirty seven seconds.” Suikotsu says as he helps an old lady in a walker with standing up and sitting down.

“What do you want today?” I encourage him. God, he’s beautiful when he’s frustrated. We raised the bars just for him, because his legs dangle and it makes it hard for him when they touch the ground. His eyes are the strangest color gold I have ever seen and his cheeks have these strange purple marks I’m going to ask about later. I’m going to youtube him tonight. There is something in his eyes as he struggles against his own weight, a fire is brewing in his chest and I want to see what he was like before.

“Six minutes,” he tells me, adjusting his grip, walking forward on his hands. His eyes close and I can see the deep breathing, the control of an athlete coming back to him.

“Takahashi! Takahashi!” I clap my hands. His bottom lip is full while the top is partially thin and for five seconds, while I’m in his face cheering him on, I think of planting one on him. What the hell am I thinking? He’s my patient, not my boyfriend. Fuck, I haven’t even had a boyfriend since Byakuya. He was a Neurosurgeon resident and between my doctoral hours and him working 60-80 hours a week, we never saw each other. “Five minutes, forty seconds.”

He’s struggling. Sweat drips down his forehead, into his silver bangs, down his nose and onto his lips and oh my god, he licks his lips and all it would take is just a little effort on my part and I could taste what he does. Sweat, tastes like salt and that on lips as beautiful as his, what the hell am I doing?

I mean, I used to love that feeling, that high of working out, of being in the gym six hours a day and flying around the ice as if God himself gave me wings. It’s why I’ve been back on the ice every morning for the last two weeks. He adjusts his grip again. “You can do it. Ten more seconds.”

“Shit,” he curses, letting me know he’s reaching his limits. His chest heaves in and out with the effort.

“Don’t give up Sesshomaru, you can do it.” My hands are on his because I need to be ready to catch him. He can still break bones with legs like his and not feel it. He’s a warrior.

During the two weeks I had off, I did a bit of research on this man in front of me. He was just like me, only older and injured later. He was sixteen at his first Olympics and won almost everything he competed at. Floor was his weakest point. The majority of his strength was in his arms. He never gave up. He once fell off the pommel horse, racking himself on the way down and got back up and finished. He has guts and I admire that. “I can’t,” he forces out and his arms are rippling red with muscles.

“Ten seconds, you can.” I let my arms creep up his sides just in case, but it feels more like I am embracing him instead. “I believe in you.” Our eyes meet and there is a sudden flash of electricity. His mouth is so close to mine and for a moment I can’t breathe.

His fingers flex and I know he’s going to go down.

“Five seconds,” I let him know, “four, three, two,” as soon as I say _one_ he’s down and I catch him and load him into his chair to rest. He puffs and huffs, catching his breath but he’s smiling and rubbing his arms. “Next time six minutes and five seconds. Come on. Let me get your massage and get you out of here.”

I walk tenderly on my ankle and knee. Jak had wanted to see it and even took pictures to send to Bankotsu who was at a meeting downtown. I help Sesshomaru onto the table and this time he is wearing shorts so I can reach his legs easier. They are skinnier than they should be and I take my time on them, massaging the flesh I know he can’t feel it.

“How did your mother die?” the question throws me off as I massage his calves.

“Cancer.”

“I think I would rather have that than this,” he says, speaking into his hands.

“Why is that?” I learned this technique from Kagura, she told me one time she was working with a patient suffering from Orthostatic Intolerance, basically they couldn’t stand up without feeling dizzy. This patient went to a doctor for help and was told they shouldn’t cry, it wasn’t terminal, but that didn’t take into account the changes the patient had to make to her life.

“Death.”

My stomach pitches, but again this isn’t my journey and caring for the mind is just as important as caring the body.

He exhales heavily as I move up to his hips and I wonder if he feels any relief from my efforts. I can already feel the difference two weeks of real work has made in his muscles. They are firmer and also more flexible, less bundle like and smooth. “How is your back?”

“I’m not suicidal.”

“I know,” I say, affirming him. “Would you be opposed to me massaging your butt?”

“Can’t resist, can you?” He smiles back at me.

I want to slap his ass but I don’t. “It’s just for circulation. I can ask Suikotsu to do it. Or Jakotsu.”

“No thank you,” he says firmly. “Go ahead. Anything else you want to massage?”

“You pervert.” I dig into his cheeks to get the blood moving.

“Says the one with their hands on my ass.”

“You can’t feel it anyway.”

“No,” he chuckles. “But I can feel something else.”

And suddenly I’m bright red because I know exactly what it is. He has a nice ass, for someone who can’t get up, a little flat but with any help it will be in good shape again when I am done with it. There is a part that feels off and I ask him, “can I…I think you might be getting a bedsore back here.”

“Is that your way of asking to look at my ass?”

This man is infuriating! “For medical purposes,” but then I lean over him with a grin on my face, “Hey Jak!!”

“Don’t you dare!” He tries to sit up but I keep a hand on his back so he can’t. “I will not have him looking at my backside!”

“What is it Rinny?” Jak comes over with a big grin. Today he’s wearing a pink skirt, with neon green leggings and a turquoise mid-drift.

“I think he has a bedsore on his glutes.”

“Oooh, can I see?” Jak jumps up and down.

“No!” Sesshomaru yells.

“Well then, I guess you won’t mind if I look will you?” I laugh at him as Jak goes back to his patients. I pull down the top of his shorts and sigh. “It looks like grade one. Soap and water when you get home and try to spend less time on your ass.” I go back to massaging his back. “I have to thank you.” I lift up his white shirt and start on the area that I know hurt him the most. “I went ice skating again after we first met.”

“Really? A little late isn’t it?”

“I don’t plan on competing.”

“Scared?”

“God you’re ridiculous! No…I thought…”

“That I would care and gush about how brave you are? Please, if you had any sense you would have tried again after the injury was healed.”

“I did—”

“And then copped out,” he says so smugly that I want to kill him.

I swear to god…and all that is holy, I am going to kill him. I move up to his shoulders and bite my tongue to keep myself from speaking. I did not think he would be proud of me and no I’m not scared of competing again. I’m twenty five, it’s not like I have much of a career left for me, I’m too old. Maybe if I found a partner I could do ice-dancing.

“I think you’ve spent enough time in that spot,” he lifts his torso up to look at me and it dawns on me I have been massaging the same area for the last ten minutes without moving. I sit down in front of him and start on his arms. Today I have cream for his hands to help with the callouses he has developed. I come down to his hands and massage his left palm in circular motions, sliding my fingers to thread through his when he closes his fingers around mine and his face softens. For a minute, he holds my hand and static passes between us…until Jak comes over and says, “Sess…I think you got a problem.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ya'll let me know how you are surviving isolation.


	6. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru finally admits his greatest fear.

**Sesshomaru**

I’m not entirely sure how long I’ve been sitting in this perforated chair under the shower, letting the water pelt my face and back. There is a failure rate to control of bodily functions with paralysis and I’ve just experienced it. It’s why I prefer to stay home, but nothing beats the humiliation of not feeling that you are dripping down the side of the therapy bed while staring at a beautiful woman. The truth is, I was lost in her eyes while she was massaging the callouses on my palms and not paying attention to what was happening below.

So here I sit, hoping the world disappears with my hands over my face, trying to ignore the fact that said beautiful woman is probably outside the door cleaning up the wet mess on the table while I sulk.

People often ask what’s the worst part about waking up paralyzed? Is it the fear of suddenly not knowing your own body? Maybe it’s that you can’t move limbs that you used to be able to. For me, it was being told what I would never be able to do again. Gymnastics, no. Compete, no. Walk, run. No and no. Then there are the more concrete things like going to the bathroom when you can’t feel the same pressure that signals you as before and learning to manage that with catheters, diet and regularly scheduled bowl movements. They happen at 10am and 5pm if you were wondering. They say exercise helps but let’s be honest, I did this to myself.

“Sesshomaru, are you in here?” Inuyasha calls out from the door. Great, now my little brother knows. How far can humiliation go?

I don’t answer. I’m hidden by the shower curtain but I’m fairly certain I am the only one in here doing this, so I might as well be waving a flag over my location. He leans against the wall with his back turned and a leg cocked against the white tiling. “Are you okay? They said you’ve been in here for a while.”

“Peachy.”

“Do you need any help?” he asks nervously, because he knows that I detest help.

When I woke up in the hospital after falling, the truth is, I was on a ventilator. I couldn’t breathe on my own, barely felt my fingers and my legs…God I miss my legs. The last time I felt them was when I was swinging into that triple pike that ended me. The swelling was compressing the rest of my spine and for the first few days I couldn’t even write on a pad, only listen to what everyone else had to say.

Starting with how sorry they were and how the press wanted a statement and how everything would be okay, because God is omnipotent and has a plan. All I know is that plan has involved years embarrassment, pain and a life I never asked for.

As the swelling went down, I was taken off the ventilator to breathe on my own. Feeling came back in my hands, but three weeks later, when I was finally able to be transferred to a rehabilitation facility in Denver, I still couldn’t feel my legs.

Of course Dad showed up a week later saying he came as soon as he could. And mom who was with me in Rio, hadn’t left her hotel room and when they found her she had to have her stomach pumped. Dad said something along the lines of these things happen, so let’s make the best of it. Right…I had to learn to dress myself again, to maneuver a wheel chair that gives new meaning to the term wide load, to cath myself so I don’t have accidents like the one outside and to manage a plethora of new health issues, I didn’t have before. These things happen.

“Go away,” I bark at my brother. I don’t want him here.

He curses then walks out, but then the door stays open and another set of feet come in and all of a sudden Rin is leaning against the wall by the shower.

“This is the men’s bathroom,” I remind her.

“Yeahm but I’m allowed in if my patient is having issues and there are no other men in the room. Besides Renkotsu is listening by the door. You okay?”

“Wonderful,” I lie, because humiliation apparently knows no bounds. “Don’t tell me it’s normal and happens to everyone.”

“I wasn’t going to. I’m sure you feel upset and humiliated. I just came to see if you were okay.”

“Wonderful,” I sit up finally leaning against the cold tiled wall. It’s amazing how the steam can surround me and the tiles are still cold so my chest burns and my back freezes.

She opens the curtain and I immediately cup myself. It was not in my plan for her to see me naked this early. But what I am not expecting is for her to take the shower head down and start rinsing my hair out without speaking. She guides the silver strands, a genetic gift from my father over my shoulder and then takes the shampoo and begins lathering my scalp, massaging my temples, the sides of my head, down to the base of my skull where I find myself instinctively leaning into her fingers as the tension leaves me.

I feel the absence when her hands leave and she brings the shower-head over my scalp and eddies swirl around the drain of the shower below. She hands me a washcloth with soap on it that I take and then she turns away while I clean myself. When I’m finished, she takes the shower head and rinses the soap off my back, turns the water off and hands me a towel. “Do you keep a change of clothes in there?” She points at my chair and I nod.

She bends down and finds them underneath in a bag that she hangs next to the shower, only for her to take another towel and start drying my hair. “Is this part of your job requirements? Bathe the pathetic?”

“Mmh?” She’s adorable when she thinks. “I just thought you might still want your massage.”

“Don’t you have other patients?”

“It’s my first day Sesshomaru, I don’t have any patients. Did I ever tell you about the time I peed my pants on the ice?”

I snort and laugh. “I think you’re lying.”

“Nope.” She slides her middle finger through some loose strands of hair, tucking them behind her ear. “It was at the Sears competition, when I was fourteen. I was really hungry and running behind, so I grabbed a giant chocolate milkshake on the way to the rink and a giant coffee.”

By now I’m laughing. “An amateur mistake.” You never go into competition with a full bladder.

“Anyway, by the time I got there, I had enough time to change, no bathroom before my long program. So I went for it and I swear each time I went up for a jump and landed, my bladder dropped lower and lower, until the end, when I couldn’t hold it anymore and everyone swore I was crying at the end because I skated an average program and knew I could do better. Really, it was because the last camel spin set my bladder loose and I made a figure eight across the rink peeing myself.”

I’m holding my stomach because I’m laughing so hard. Rule number one of competition: stay hydrated and pee before your performance…apparently she forgot that. “Was it a yellow figure eight?”

“No, I was hydrated enough it was clear and thank God no one noticed that steady trickle of pee coming down my legs. I blame it on wearing pants instead of a tutu.”

“What’s a camel spin?”

“This,” she takes a step back and bends over holding one leg behind her, both arms out smiling. “You can either spin in a circle like this or glide along the ice. It seems easy at first but it takes balance, or you end up on your face.”

She looks like a goddess floating and I get mental flashes of her on the ice. Her muscles flex from her down into her legs. I reach out and push down on the upraised thigh. “What are you doing?”

“Seeing how strong you are,” I answer. “Can you keep your leg up with pressure?”

“I’m game. Push as hard as you can. One minute—”

“Baby.”

“Okay two—”

“Half-ass.”

“How long?”

“Six minutes.”

“Then I get what?”

“Is that why you quit? The medals were your reason?”

“No,” she snaps and offense creases her face. “I was scared.” She flattens out again, leg poised and back arched, like a gorgeous butterfly.

It’s then I put pressure on her hamstrings and she wavers lightly.

“I need to start lifting again. I’ve only gone on the ice every morning for the last two weeks but my muscles are shot.”

“Have you tried any jumps yet?”

“No.” There’s something in her voice as she says ‘no’ that sets alarms off in my brain.

“You’re still scared.” I glance at her watch, while her body starts to tremble. It’s no easy feat to engage muscles that haven’t been used in years. “What are you so afraid of?”

“What are you afraid of?” she bites back. She has determination in her eyes, her leg is lowering. “Push back.”

She pushes hard to keep her leg up and that adorable nose of hers wrinkles. “I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll tell you what I’m afraid of, if you tell me what you’re afraid of.”

“I have no fears,” I answer as arrogantly as possible but that’s not entirely true.

“I think we both know, god that hurts.” I can feel her struggling against me and her bottom lip starts to shake with effort. “Two minutes? Really?” She takes a deep breath and evens her breathing out with the precision of an athlete. “We both know that isn’t true. You are pissed at the world. You’ve purposely avoided relationships, friends, family as far as I can tell.” The words come out clipped and through clenched teeth.

I put more pressure on her leg just to get back at her.

She snorts back, “see? So what is it? You could coach—”

“I’ve heard that before.”

“You were good Takahashi. The best, is this really all you wanted? To spend the rest of your life in that chair? Fuck!” Her leg falls because I lean all my weight on it and she catches herself on the wall. “That was cheating and proved my point. You are scared.”

“Fine,” I chew on my lip, “being forgotten. Are you happy now?”

“Why would that make me happy?” She leans down in front of me and I’ve completely forgotten that besides the towel covering my lap, I’m completely naked. “You know what I’m afraid of? Landing, because if I land, I might not want to settle any longer.”

My hand covers hers and for seconds our eyes connect and it all makes sense. She would be old to start again, but it wouldn’t be impossible for her to try again, to try to compete again.

“Rin?” Renkotsu calls from the door.

“I know, we’re almost done Renkotsu. Do you need anything else before I get out of here so you can get dressed?”

“Have dinner with me tonight?” Even I am shocked at my request but when her face falls, I know I’ve over stepped. “Right…why date someone like me?”

“It’s not that, it’s not you. It’s just we’re not allowed to date patients,” she says nervously and motions with her head over to Renkotsu who is standing by the door, our chaperone. “You’re a good man Sesshomaru. I’m sure you’ll find someone.”

What I don’t tell her as she leaves and I get dressed is that I had someone…she just couldn’t handle this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudo and Comment please! I love to hear it!


	7. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin continues to help Sesshomaru, but he digs his heels in. She gets the test results back for the BRCA1 gene and then something happens to Sesshomaru.

**Rin**

I feel horrible leaving him in the bathroom. You're probably wondering how I can walk in on a naked man in the shower and not have a bigger reaction. I've been around them before. Accidents are normal in paraplegia. In fact, it's one of the things that probably sucks the most because they wake up, and feel like they are in a body that no longer belongs to them. The injury to the spine affects the nerves that tell the bladder to contract and makes the intestines work. Depending on where the injury is, bowl movements can become a problem too.

"Girl what did he say to you?" Jak asks me. "Your face is redder than a tomato. I bet he has a nice ass." He elbows me.

"He wasn't bad to look at. He's definitely lost muscle mass though. If you compare now to four years ago…I would have thought he would have at least kept the upper body."

"Use it or lose it," Suikotsu says, coming up from behind me. "Is he alright?"

"Just embarrassed, but he'll be fine." Especially because I had to shoot him down and that made me feel even worse. I can't lose this job. Sango and Miroku gave up so much for me when they took me in. I'm finally financially independent and I just can't do this to them, or to Kohaku. It's his turn next to go to college if he wants to. If we can convince him to.

Sesshomaru comes back out with his clothes changed, with Inuyasha behind him. Okay, maybe they are both something to look at. It's the golden eyes and broad shoulders. "I'll skip the massage today," he tells me coldly, avoiding my eyes. The second the wheel chair stops, he propels himself forward almost running over my toes.

"What?" Okay that doesn't make sense, I run after him. "Why? It'll help your muscles. At least let me finish off your arms before you go?"

"No," he quips and keeps spinning himself forward like he didn't just ask me out in the bathroom. Great, now I've ruined what little confidence he has left.

"Oh before I forget." Inuyasha hands me a bag. "We washed your clothes and Kagome dropped your coat off at the dry-cleaners. They said it should be ready in two days. Here's the receipt."

"Thanks." Wow, it's not every day someone is willing to do that for you.

"It's the least we can do…you actually have him excited to come here for more than bothering the staff. Just don't let my brother get under your skin."

"I've had worse patients." And isn't that the truth. I once had this man that purposely farted while I did the cool down massage, every time. Then there was the old woman who I couldn't make happy no matter what I did. Everything always hurt. The water wasn't cold enough to drink. The machines were too tall for her…I once broke down in tears because I couldn't make her happy. Kagura told me that part of the job was accepting that not everyone was going to succeed. Their journey, not mine. And when you accept that, you learn to do the best you can and hope that your patients reach their goals.

"Well, I have to get him home and then get back to school," Inuyasha tells me and heads out after his brother.

"Bitch," Jakotsu slaps my arm and pulls me into the bathroom. "What the hell happened?"

"What do you mean?"

"That foxy son of bitch did your laundry?"

"That foxy son of bitch's wife did my laundry because I slipped and fell into a patch of muddy ice. I fell right into Sesshomaru's lap and he wheeled me back to their house."

"You sat on his lap?" Jakotsu takes out a nail filer and brushes it back and forth against his nails. "Lucky."

"I don't think so."

"I'd sit on his lap." Jak laughs at me.

"You'd do more than that."

"Uh-huh."

"You know this is the women's bathroom Jak?"

"Is it? Since when is that a problem?"

* * *

I wake up to a towel being thrown at my head. "Hey sleepy head," Kohaku calls from my door. "Time to get up." He throws the curtains open, blinding me in white light.

I immediately throw a hand up to block my eyes and groan. He's never up this early. I want to die under my pillow after the long day I had yesterday and my knee still hurts but Kohaku jumps on the bed next to me, bouncing his ass up and down. "Get up."

"I'm up," I grumble out. "What are you doing up? No one keeping your bed warm?"

"Very funny," he smacks my hip. "I'm going to the rink with you this morning."

"What? Why?" That makes me sit up. He's come to watch me a few times, but usually I'm there first.

"Because it's time to land that double that you're terrified of. Besides I have nothing else to do and I drank too much caffeine to stay up for my gig last night. So, it's you and me. Let's do this." He grabs my arm and hauls me out of bed. "Hey what's this?" Hak picks up my knee that still has butterfly band-aids on it.

"I fell after my appointment yesterday—"

"You didn't call me?"

"Hak, I'm not a little girl anymore. I'm twenty five. It'll heal in a week." His face falls, making me feel guilty. "Hak, it's nothing. I've gotten worse."

"Yeah but you broke the code. One of us is hurt—"

"We all hurt," we say in unison. That's something we learned from our mothers. I swear they were beamed down from a planet where no matter the shit you pulled, at the end of the day, you were family and that is all that matters.

When my aunt got sick, my mom gave up everything to take care of her. And I mean everything. She sold our grandparents house and used the money to pay for Rina's treatments and then quit her job when Rina got so sick she ended up in hospice. She wasn't going to let her sister die alone.

All that time, she kept Sango and Kohaku distracted. Kohaku remembers that the day his mom died my mom got him a brand new bike and birthday cake. Not because it was his birthday, but she wanted him to know that life moves on, just like the wheels on a bike. There are ups and downs but it's all part of one big circle.

I miss my mom.

Fingers snapping in front of my face, bring me back to reality. Hak and I share an _I know_ look. I rest my head in the crook of his neck and let a few tears slip down my cheeks. "I'm scared Kohaku."

"I know sis." He wipes my cheeks down with his thumb. "But the only way to get past this, is to just do it."

"But what if I land a double and I can't stop there and I want more? I'm twenty five. I'm too old to get back into this."

"You'll do what feels right. Just like you always have. Except for when you were dating that ass."

"Don't bring that up. Hey," I grip his sides, "you've been working out. Your lats are bigger."

"Gotta do something with my downtime. Gotta burn all those lattes. Come on. Shippo is gonna meet us at the rink and we'll pretend like it's old times again."

All of us work early and don't have cars. Shippo meets us at the Starbucks that he and Kohaku work at. It's also conveniently located just a few blocks from where we live. It's off to the rink after that and that's when my hands start sweating. I've done simple things on the ice since I started skating again. Like flying camels, spinning until I felt sick to my stomach, camel spins and single jumps. Those were always easy once you got the hang of them. Today though, I don't want to do a double, because if I can, what else am I going to want. I swore after that panic attack I would never get on the ice again—

"Come on," Kohaku wraps an arm around my waist and hauls me through the doors.

"I think this is a mistake." I try to escape.

"Nope, you're doing it. Come on! It'll be fun!" Shippo tries to sound encouraging but he has a death grip on my upper arm. "I landed a double last week."

"Since when did you start skating again?" I snap at him, resigned to my fate. We get down to the bottom level, just before the ice and start stretching.

"I never really stopped. I just stopped competing. I was good at it, but not that good. Besides, I still want to finish college," he replies. Shippo is adorable. He's one of those guys that is short and petite, but has an attitude the size of a six foot tall man. "Bachelor of Arts in Writing. I'm almost done and then," he drops into a perfect split that makes my eyes water, "off to grad school. I think I'm going to teach and get a masters at the same time."

"You're going to make less than I will mixing drinks at the coffee shop," Kohaku laughs as he leans over his legs, stretching his trunk. "God this hurts."

"Loosen up." I sit down behind my brother and correct his form and then massage his back to help loosen his muscles.

"Everyone should have a sister that can give massages." Shippo grins.

It makes me roll my eyes. I was always good at massages. I get up and pull my skates on, stepping on the ice and start circling the rink. Kaede is already in the center of the ice giving directions to two of her skaters. "Unwritten" by Natasha Bedingfeld plays and I start dancing to it. Nothing to fancy, a twist here, a spread eagle there and some fancy footwork. It loosens me up enough to try to jump.

By then Kohaku and Shippo are on the ice with me and we're pirouetting around each other laughing. Shippo lands a double axel and then throws a triple and lands on his ass. Kohaku does a single and then dares me to do a double toe loop with him. We start skating backwards almost like we are in sync with each other. We twist and turn, ready to jump but the second I go up, I pop the jump and land after a single twist while Kohaku lands on his ass sliding into the wall. "Oh come on!" he yells at me. "You could have landed that. I saw it. Your form was perfect."

I help him off the ice and Shippo slides up next to us. "You're just scared."

I am not, but that's not true. My face is burning and my hands are shaking. "Guys, I can't do this."

"Fear is just your mind telling you no. We both know you can do it." Kohaku grabs my hand and sets me up again. We start twirling, getting used to the feel of the ice. This time he goes up and comes back down managing a one and a half. He takes my hand and pulls me back against his chest, just like when we used to skate together. "I'm going to throw you."

"What?"

"Nope, I'm gonna toss you like a bag of potatoes."

"Don't you dare."

"Flying axel. Yep and if you fall, it'll be your own fault."

"Fuck no! Kohaku!" I shriek, but he's already got me off the ice. I try locking my weight to get out of his grasp and now I know exactly why he has been working on his upper body strength. "Don't you dare."

We start moving to the back of the rink. "Piece of cake sis, come on, we can do it."

"I've gained like thirty pounds since I was fifteen! No!"

"Not gonna stop me!" He spins, lifting me up. "Better get ready!"

The world starts spinning. He lifts me higher.

"I hope you're ready!"

_Don't let me fall, don't let me fall, don't let me fall!_ I scream when he tosses me at the backboards but I'm ready. I get into position, locking my arms against my chest, wrapping my legs around each other and land a perfect double toe loop. What started as a shriek of fear, ends as a whoop of triumph. I fucking did it! I fly at Kohaku leaping into his arms. We twirl around celebrating and Kaede turns on 'A Time for Us.' The song I fell to at the Olympics and I start skating a completely imperfect routine with my friends by my side. "You're back!" Kaede claps her hands.

I'm back and I don't want to stop.

* * *

I'm at work two hours later, barely able to walk. My hamstrings and groin muscles kill and my leg is still a bit sore from falling in the muddy ice. My legs feel like jelly. Jak comes running up to me with a big, goofy grin on his face. "Who'd you fuck!"

"Oh my god, Jak!" I grab his arm and drag him into the break room. "Is that all you think about?"

"Let's see, clothes, shoes and dick, yep." He ticks them off like he's making a grocery list. Today he's wearing a big black, wavy wig with a tight pink sundress.

"Aren't you cold?"

"Honey it's winter outside but not in my heart," he swoons. "So dish. Who'd you fuck? You look like someone shoved lead between your legs and left it wiggling."

"No one. I went skating at the rink this morning and landed a few doubles!"

We both scream making all six of his brothers come running and my face blooms with color. "What's going on?" Bankotsu asks, very professionally and suddenly I'm embarrassed.

"Bitch landed doubles on her bum ass knee!" Jak turns the radio on and we start dancing. "What you think momma, are you gonna try to compete again?"

"Congratulations," Bankotsu says excitedly. "Did you feel any residual effects on the knee?"

"No. I didn't feel anything, not a twinge, a pinch or anything."

"That's amazing," Suikotsu pipes in and after five minutes of talking about my ligaments and comparing notes and whether or not I should push it further than what I have been the day begins. It's my second day and I'm given paperwork in the morning to fill out that takes all day as well as training videos. Just when I think I'm about to go cross eyed, Jak and I run out to grab lunch and before I know it's afternoon. Suikotsu reminds me that I get to work with Sesshomaru again.

I've decided on doing Passive Range of Motion Exercises today. That means we use something to wrap his legs and he'll work on lifting them. It helps to tighten the core muscles and make sitting up easier, which should help with the pain he constantly has in his back.

He comes on time at three o'clock like usual, brought in by his brother. "Hey," I say happily, "ready to work today?"

It's the silence and icy glare that throw me off. I thought we were passed this or at least had moved on to some semblance of camaraderie.

"Call me if you need anything. I got this rotation off, so I'll be at home studying," Inuyasha says and waves.

"I won't," Sesshomaru calls over his shoulder and divests himself of his puffer coat and hat.

"Well, I figure we start with some warm up exercises and then have you done Passive Range of Motion Exercises before?"

"You read my chart?"

"Yes."

"Then you should know."

I blow out air, then take a deep breath. I can handle this. He's mad about the other day. "Well, I read that they tried to do them with you. But come on, show me how strong you are. I know you'll be able to do them."

He rolls past me and nearly crushes my toe while he's at it. I know he's mad at me. Trust me, the rest of the appointment doesn't pass that much better. He's tight lipped and won't talk to me until I have him on the parallel bars and he lifts himself out of the chair like it's nothing. I get lost looking at the ceiling, wondering if I could get some rings to hang up there. The ceiling looks sturdy enough and maybe it would help him feel like he has more power. "I landed a double this morning."

"Aren't you special. Weren't you landing quads before?"

"Yes—"

"Then why should I be impressed if you only did half?" His muscles flex against the bars and his brow bubbles with sweat. "Is that a millennial thing? I half-assed my work, oh look at me?"

I push the hurt down, because let's be honest, there can never be anything between us and this is just anger. Even if I do think he's kind of cute, especially when he's mad. His arms start shaking at the two minute point and he grimaces as if he's in pain. He did the same thing on the floor exercises when he was lifting his legs up to his chest. "Are you okay?"

"Wonderful."

"Does your stomach hurt?"

"You asked that before, the answer is the same," he speaks so quickly I can hardly register what he is saying.

"You're being a jerk," Danny laughs from the side.

"Hush you!" Jak ruffles his hair. "You decide what color tennis balls we're gonna put on the bottom of your crutches when you get your skinny a—"

"Jak!" Ban yells from his room.

"Sorry, I mean your butt out of that chair?" Jak scratches his wig nervously.

"Pink?" Danny asks.

"That's my boy."

"So you can make him as gay as you are?" Sesshomaru bites out and falls long before he hits his goal of six minutes.

"Easy." I catch him under the arms, feeling his weight like a ton of bricks and put him back in the chair. "That was uncalled for."

But he says nothing back to me. He's livid at me for rejecting him.

"Oh don't worry about it, he's not as bigoted as he seems." Jak rubs my shoulders. "What the hell happened in that bathroom?"

"Nothing."

"Like hell nothing."

"Jak!" I push him off and go back to the table once Sesshomaru has situated himself and start his cool down massage. He feels slightly warmer but he also just came off the bars, so I don't worry about it. After we're done, he leaves and I can't believe we're back to square one.

The next day, Shippo and Kohaku drag me to the rink again. I remember how the hardest part of being an athlete is the constant pain. My legs feel like someone has been burning them alive. Moving hurts, but I get on the ice anyway for an hour before I ride the bus to the other side of town, leaving my brother and Shippo to go to the coffee shop. It's business as usual and another day of watching training videos and filling out paperwork. This time I get a stack of patients that will be mine in the next few weeks and before I know it, it's three o'clock again and _he_ shows up, still madder than a hatter. This time, he won't even speak to me, no matter how I try.

Until he is on the bars. Halfway through our session I stopped trying to talk to him and just gave him instructions. We did passive work again, sit ups and leg lifts using his hands, to get his core in a better place and I swear his eyes look a little red around the edges. He did little more than let me instruct him and blew me off.

"So you going to try a triple?" Jak asks me. He's helping Danny get out of his chair and get used to walking on crutches. The little boy has been working hard for years to walk.

"Why would I do that?"

"Because if you could, you could compete again," Jak tells me and I roll my eyes.

"Like I could. I'm thirty pounds heavier and I would have to get five hours of rink time in a day, a coach, ballet…I can't do that and work here. I can't ask Sango and Miroku to sacrifice more of their lives for me."

"How are their babies anyway?"

"Almost seven months old. Keaton just started crawling and Kelsey isn't that far behind. Straighten your back when you pull up—"

"I don't need your help," Sesshomaru bites out. The sting dip down my spine like someone is pricking me with needles.

"And if you do it wrong, you'll end up hurt."

His eyes turn red and I swear he grows fangs. "If I needed help from some has been on ice, I would let you know. You know nothing about form on the bars. No wonder you settled for being a physical therapist. You didn't have what it takes!"

I bite my bottom lip trying to ignore it, but half the room can hear him berating me.

"Your parents are probably ashamed of the waste of time and money you are."

"You—" I'm about to start, but my eyes are already burning with tears.

"I'll take over," Jak steps in quickly.

"Protecting her?" Sesshomaru snaps at him.

"No, protecting you. Her momma died from cancer, Lord rest her soul and if you don't watch your mouth, she's gonna bury you too."

But I can't hear what else Jak says because I am too upset. I run into the break room and start sobbing hysterically. I was twelve when mom died and yes, Sango and Miroku gave up everything for me and I mean everything. While I'm crying, I call Sango. In typical mom fashion, she answers after the first ring out of breath. "Are you proud of me?" I ask her, swallowing my sobs.

"Rin, what happened?" I can hear the twins crying in the background.

"Was I worth all the craziness when I was competing?"

"All of it. What happened?"

"Just some jerk patient," I whisper, wiping my nose with a tissue. "Was mom proud of me?"

"So proud Rin," Sango says and then adds, "you know she was. Her dying wish was that you wouldn't give up skating no matter what."

"I landed a double."

"Amazing. Are you going to try a triple?"

"Maybe in a few weeks."

"You know if you wanted to compete again, we'd be behind you."

"I don't. I'm just doing this for fun. I gotta go."

"Bye honey. Don't let them get under your skin."

When I hang up, Jak is behind me shutting the door. "Okay, spill! What happened in that bathroom?" He folds his arms.

"He asked me out and I said no."

Jak's mouth hits the floor. "No wonder he's pissed. He's outside the door. He wants to talk to you."

"Can't you say I'm dead?"

"Don't let him win honey. You are the first person in four years he has connected to. You can do this. Get over here." Jak pulls me into a tight hug and rubs my back. "We both know your momma is up in heaven looking down on you, her shining light. He's just jealous. His mom is a raging alcoholic and his dad has never shown up for a single appointment. He's lonely and alone, the worst combination."

"Do I have to talk to him?"

"Professionalism baby." Jak takes out a tissue and starts dabbing my eyes dry. "Now go one, puffy cheeks. We'll go out and get shit faced at a club tonight. Ooh is your brother playing at the Stonewall?"

"Yeah tonight and tomorrow night."

"Then we'll do that. Go deal with puddles."

I take a deep breath and then another, trying to get myself together and walk out the door. He's sitting in his chair with a hard look on his face and as I approach, he motions me off to a corner, which is about as private as it's going to get. I sit down in a chair and cross my legs. This isn't the first time a patient made me cry. At Wind, this one old guy liked getting feely on the ladies and I was his victim multiple times until Kagura kicked him out. Nothing like being groped by a grandpa.

"I'm sorry," Sesshomaru says tacitly. "I forgot that you had said your mother died."

I shrug my shoulders and the tears start burning again. I miss her so much.

"Oh please don't cry."

"You insulted my mother."

"Technically your mother and your father—"

"You can insult my dad all you want. I don't get you," my breath shudders. I force my emotions back down and chew my bottom lip. "Don't you want anything? To drive? To live independently, play a sport? I know you aren't happy. If you were, you wouldn't be such an…" I stop short of saying more.

"An ass?"

"You said it, not me."

"Why do you care?"

"You're used to people not caring aren't you?" Don't I know it. Everyone loves you when you are on the top, but recovery is lonely. Especially if family isn't there. "Why shouldn't I? Even if I wasn't in this position and there could be something more between us, I would. You have so much potential Sesshomaru, you are so strong and you put all your value on your ability to do a triple salto—"

"Is this where you tell me I could do more? I could be more?"

"You have to dream of something."

"The rings."

"You still could. Get your arm strength back and we could get you on some rings, climbing a rope again, driving—"

"And that fixes me how?"

"I'm not trying to fix you."

"Then what?"

I lean back in the chair smiling, remembering how free I felt on the ice this morning and that he will never get that back. "To live and enjoy it." I take a risk and pick his hand up, rubbing the calluses on his palms. "You are so much stronger than you give yourself credit for."

His hands are warm. His skin is both rough and soft at the same time. He doesn't have a chance to answer. Inuyasha is there with his wife and their two year old comes flying at Sesshomaru jumping into his lap. For the first time, I see him smile. "Until tomorrow." I take off, because I can already hear Inuyasha berating him. I look like I've been crying and Sesshomaru's brother can see it.

* * *

Four days later, I finally have my test results from the doctor. We're used to this, Sango, Kohaku and I. When our moms were alive, we would go out to eat and dish the news. Was the cancer in remission? Did the last treatment work? How much time was left? When mom said it was terminal, she told us over a fudge covered ice-cream brownie. She said we should at least have something sweet while we swallowed the bitter news.

We pooled resources to pay for Kohaku to get tested. He was the last to get his results. "We need to buy a car," he tells me, while we ride the bus bundled in coats, hats and gloves. It's so cold my ears ache.

"Hak, I'm not buying you a car." Although I wouldn't mind one for myself. It would be easier to get to the rink in the morning and I wouldn't freeze my ass of going to work after that.

"Fine," he slumps on the bus. "I'm working a gig next month at the rink. Kaede hired me to play for a Bat Mitzvah and then once a week after that."

"Excellent," I say proudly. "If only we could get you a contract somewhere."

"It's just a side gig," he tells me.

"It's your turn now. You could go to college," I remind him.

"Nah, I like working at Starbucks. Barista for life."

The bus stops, making us jolt forward. It hisses as it kneels and the ramp is lowered. I swear I'm going to choke to death because Lord Sesshomaru himself wheels himself up the ramp and as soon as he pays the toll, I turn into Kohaku's neck to hide. First off, I can't say that he's my client because of privacy laws. Second off, I've been complaining like crazy to Kohaku about him. He has been nothing but hell the last week. He may have apologized for insulting my mother but after that conversation in the lobby, he has been stubborn as hell.

He proceeded to degrade and deride me. I mean, I ignored him but then Bankotsu had to talk him out of going back to Wind, which opened a whole can of worms.

"What are you doing?" Kohaku tries to pull me out.

"He's…" I stumble over my words. "I'm cold." I can lie to my brother.

"Okay," the word comes out slurred as he rubs my back and arms. Oh please don't see me…not now.

The bus stops and Sesshomaru gets off first. I let out a tense breath, hoping my big brother doesn't notice. We get off at the next stop. We're meeting up at a swanky Italian restaurant that's going to leave me feeling bloated and well, I won't be the only one with bathroom issues by the time I'm done here.

"Hey Sango!" I run up to her and Miroku. They are already there with their adorable twin girls. They babble in their chairs laughing, while Kohaku makes funny faces for them. "How's the new job?" Miroku asks me. He's like the perfect model boyfriend, just not tall. He completed a masters in Eastern Spiritual Practices and runs his own Tai Chi dojo in downtown.

Kohaku is our garage band, college dropout brother and Sango gave up her job as a martial arts instructor and professional fencer to mommy, but what else is new?

Sango told me about that meeting she had with Miroku. They had been dating for not even six months when my mom died. He spent the night at our house and the next morning social services showed up on our doorsteps for Kohaku and I. Sango said, "over my dead body." She called the family lawyer and showed them my mother's will. Sango inherited the house where she still lives with Miroku, the insurance policy and even after that, she had to give up her career as a professional fencer, something my mother was against.

She told Miroku flat out, she was taking us in. Whether or not he was onboard with it was his own problem. We tried to talk her into staying in the fencing world, but she wanted us to come home from school, well practice for me, to a home with food cooking. They were married a month later.

Miroku to the dismay of his parents, said he would take us in too and that was that. When we got really low on money she would enter fencing competitions to make ends meet and Miroku worked night and day teaching to keep a roof over our head. He even pushed college off for us.

And me, they gave up so much so I could compete. I thought winning an Olympic gold would pay them back, but when my knee snapped, it was like it all came to an end. "Are you okay?" Hak asks me, covering my hands with his. "Is it hurting?"

It twinges. "More snow must be coming. But we didn't come here to talk about my knee." The waitress comes, a spunky woman you know has been doing this as a career, with skin like sandpaper, that tells her own story. I always wonder what dreams they had to give up. Was she a young mom? Did she not have enough money for college?

She prattles on about my nieces, giving them extra straws to play with and how she is a grandmother and what she did when her kids were that age. I order a coke with cherry syrup like I'm twelve again. "Remember the first time we came into this restaurant?"

"You had just gotten notice that you were Olympic eligible," Miroku smiles proudly. "You know I've never regretted it, taking you two in, becoming a father at nineteen. You two were my life, you are my life." He holds his hands out to us, "and no matter what you tell me, nothing changes."

I get teary eyed because I'm not happy with the phone call. "I'm positive," the words come out in a whisper.

"Rin," Sango takes my hands in hers. "It's going to be okay and you know they said the gene doesn't mean you will end up sick."

"I know," I flick the tears off my cheeks and Kohaku wraps an arm around my shoulders. I lean against him finding strength in his arms.

"At least we know," Miroku says leaning back in his chair. Keaton and Kelsey giggle while they smack the straws against the table and Miroku hands them some french-fries to eat.

"Well, if we're riding the bad news train," Kohaku says, "I'm a carrier."

"I'm negative," Sango exhales and even if I don't feel relief, I can see it swimming across her eyes. She won't have to worry about her children losing their mother early like we did.

"Another bowl of chips?" The waitress asks us and Kohaku says, "yes," just to break the tension at the table.

"On the plus side," I say sipping on my cherry coke, "it just means testing more often. Oh shit," I drop my cup, the soda sloshes over my hand into my lap. "Dammit." I try to grab napkins to clean the mess up just as guess who, comes rolling into the restaurant with Kagome, Inuyasha and their son.

"You really are a klutz aren't you?" Sesshomaru stops at the table with a smirk on his face and I want to slap him.

"Excuse you!" Sango's voice rises. His golden eyes are dare me to say how we know each other.

"Your table is this way sir," the hostess tries to break the tension in the air.

I slink back into Kohaku's chest as he rolls away and exhale heavily.

"What the hell was that?" Miroku asks me. "I'm going to say something to him."

"No!" I grab his arm before he can leave the booth. "Please don't."

"He insulted you!" Sango says indignantly.

"Sango? Please? Just don't." This would be so much easier if I could say he is a patient, but I can't.

"Wasn't that the guy that was on the bus with us?" Kohaku asks me. I don't even know if I should answer that, because then he'll ask why I avoided him. "Wait, is that Puddles?"

"Shut-up Kohaku," I can't believe even I started calling him that. Thursday, last week I had to beg him to get out of his chair. He didn't even want to do the parallel bars again. I told Ban I wished we had rings, maybe those would get him out of that goddamn chair.

"Puddles?" Sango asks.

"Yeah, this guy at Band of Seven who keeps giving her a hard time. He makes fun of her, teases her, gets under her skin. I told you, you have to toughen up."

I'm shrinking in my chair. "I don't, he just does. Can we just change the subject? Please? Miroku sits down."

He finally sits. "So this is one of those, you can't tell us topics?" Miroku wonders.

"Yes," I am in so much trouble on Monday.

* * *

Monday comes and he's not there, then Tuesday and by Wednesday as I'm helping Jakotsu with Danny, I'm worried. "Did he say he was switching."

"No, push harder Danny, on my palms." The little boy is on his back. We're testing the strength of his legs. He has cerebral palsy and the hope is, he won't have to use a walker forever. A year ago he was in a wheelchair barely able to move.

"Then why isn't he here? It's three thirty. Did he call?"

"Did you ask Allison?" Allison is the secretary.

"Yes…no calls…"

"Come on," he gets Danny off the floor, onto a ball and has me sit behind him to help him learn to control his core strength. "You sweet on him Rin?"

"No…maybe…I don't know. He's just a pissed off ex-athlete and I get it, I get him."

"You want to _get gotten by him_." Jak starts laughing and so do I.

"I don't want to get got by him!"

"Is that because you've never been got before and you want to get gotten by someone who'll make the getting good?"

"You two sound like Madea," Danny bounces on the bright pink exercise ball.

"Do your work," Jak rebukes him, ruffling his hair. "Listen to me, if you want get got and make the getting good—" he raises an eyebrow.

"Since when do you like ovens?"

"They provide the heat to make the baguette good. I don't just like the back entrance."

"Mommy can I eat a baguette for lunch?" Danny yells across the room.

"He wants to eat a baguette," and then we're both rolling.

"What's so funny?" Danny asks.

"Just ask for an extra butter baby. Helps it go down smoother," Jak slaps my knee.

"You're corrupting him."

"Look, if you're that worried about Puddles just call his house, if his mother isn't in a drunken stupor you can ask her and if she is, you can call his brother. He's the emergency contact anyway."

I leave Jak to work with Danny and go to the island desk that sits off to the side. The whole office is made to be green so it takes up little space because the majority of the files are all electronic. I sidle up to the computer and pull up his contact information. The home phone rings and goes to an answering machine. I leave a message and then try his cell, leaving a message there. I bite my bottom lip before I call Inuyasha's number. "Hello?" it's Kagome.

"Hey Kagome, hi, it's Rin. From Band of Seven. How are you?"

"I'm good. Kieran, get off the table!" There is a thud and then the boy starts crying. "I'm sorry, he just fell off the table. I'm sorry, can I help you?"

It sounds like a tornado is running through their house. "I was wondering about Sesshomaru. He's missed three sessions."

"You didn't hear? Dammit, Kieran, stop it! I'm on the phone."

"Hear what?" I ask nervously. God someone once said this to me and the next thing I knew the patient went into cardiac arrest in their home and never came back.

"He's in the ICU at Denver Medical."

My stomach drops into my feet. "What?"

"I'm sorry I have to go. Kieran!" The line clicks and I drop the phone, terrified of what he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Give me the comments and the kudos! I love you guys!!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru is in the ICU and Rin comes to visit.

**Sesshomaru**

There are days I ask myself how I got here. How I went from being on top of the world to sitting in a hospital bed, staring at the TV, watching reruns of Law and Order SVU. Say what you want, but Oliva got the better end of the deal when Stabler left. She at last experienced the bliss of promotions and motherhood which never would have happened if she continued to live in his ridiculous shadow. Right now they are trying a trafficker who is also the father of her adopted son. A predictable plot twist, but I cannot complain, look at how my life has turned out. How cliché is it that a world class athlete ends up a pathetic man in a hospital bed who can barely breathe on his own. I feel like shit.

I cannot even pick up a female when I am butt-naked in the bathroom. A feat that was all too easy before. I lost my virginity at sixteen, competing at worlds to an adorable little aspiring gymnast who was high on Adderall. She was just as tight as she looked. It was sloppy and clumsy but I fucked her against the bathroom wall until my knees buckled. But now, naked and bare for all to see, I failed. That is the irony of my life right now.

So instead, after I cleaned myself up, or rather she helped me clean up, I stared at my body while sitting in my wheel chair. I used to have an eight-pack, not just a six pack and I could balance coins on my biceps. My arms are still curved and the veins somewhat prominent, but my legs have thinned and my stomach is hollow and not what it once was. The reality of what I'd become crashed down on me and I went home and broke into several of my mother's hidden stashes of alcohol and ended up with a hangover that lasted for days.

The truth is, my stomach felt unwell and perchance I should not have convinced myself to return to therapy but I did. I proceeded to give the little charlatan hell, if for nothing more than to establish that she was beneath me and I did not debase myself by asking her out to eat and being rejected.

For most of the first day, she kept up that annoying perky, personality that I hate and by the end I was certain that I was going to cry as she used trunk exercises to tighten my core and the uncomfortable pain came back into my stomach. The pain was much deeper than sore muscles.

I ignored it and went home, only to sleep the rest of the afternoon and spend the evening wondering if I should make an online profile and find someone to fuck. When I competed, a good fuck often helped but there is nothing like feeling aroused and not being able to finish because you broke your back.

By the second day the burning had spread from my stomach to my back and if I had any sense, which I don't, I should have called the doctor then. Instead, I ignored it and said that I had more lumbar pain when Rin asked why I was grunting more than usual. I gave her hell and by the end of our little session, I did get her crying. I felt superior and on top of my game, until Jakotsu reminded me that her mother died when she was twelve and her father ran off because of her mother's illness and I had just insulted an orphan. Even I am not that cruel. But apologies only go so far.

Too bad she doesn't take the hint and quit like the rest of them.

When the next Monday came I gave up trying to make Rin quit and decided to work with her instead of against her. My time improved on the parallel bars and my trunk exercises went smoother when I stopped fighting her. Yet the pain in my abdomen continued.

That evening Kagome asked me to watch Kieran until a babysitter came and then meet them for dinner at a swanky Italian place. I left Kieran with Shiori, his fourteen year old sitter and miracle worker as Kagome calls her. Her hair is as white as mine and Inuyasha's and her smile even bigger. She took Kieran from me and I went downstairs to meet the bus.

Lo and Behold, who would I find on the bus but the same physical therapist who said she would not go out with me, buried in the arms of another man so deeply, I'm surprised they weren't fucking on the city bus. Her face turned bright red like the cherries that grow in my garden and I decided in that moment to pretend as if I didn't know her.

My blood boiled as I rode the bus through the city street. I purposely got off a few stops early to give myself time to calm down but then as providence would have it, there she was again in the same restaurant. Just as I was being led the opposite way, where the ramp is a table that has been positioned for people like me, I saw her again, this time with butterfingers. She dropped her soda all over the table and herself and I couldn't help but tell her how buttery I thought her fingers were.

I was certain after saying that and watching her find solace in the arms of her lover that either he or the other man at the table would come at me.

Dinner with Inuyasha and Kagome is always fascinating. They talked about school and how Kagome was struggling with Anatomy and Physiology and Inuyasha has a task master in one of his rotations and I always marvel at how they have sacrificed so much for me.

However, throughout the dinner I was distracted by Rin's laugh, the way it rises like a bird when she giggled and the melodic sound of her voice. At one point Inuyasha asked me if I was listening to him and noticed my eyes wandering and then he started laughing. "You like her."

"I do not."

"Yes you do. That's why you're so mean to her."

"No it's not."

"Did we like go back to Middle school where you pull the hair of the girl in front of you because you're too shy to ask her name."

"I was homeschooled, remember?" I replied coolly.

"That's what's wrong with you," Inuyasha started laughing again but then I'm not entirely sure what happened next. I am fairly certain that Rin left and I watched the movements of her backside as the man she was with slid an arm up her side and wrapped her in his coat.

I suddenly felt very hot and very out of breath and then everything happened at once. I heard the words hot, fever, labored breathing. Bright lights flashed in my vision and there were hands, so many hands grabbing and pulling at me as my mind descended into darkness. I hadn't felt like this since I broke my back, to be conscious and not, all at once, yet unable to breathe and catch my breath. I thought I was going to die. I heard Kagome crying. Kieran called my name and my brother, my brother was with me.

Then I dreamed of the first time I landed a triple salto pike off the rings. I was twenty. I had been practicing it for years. Most gymnasts, if trained well enough, can land it with a bounce or stepping out, but I had spent the better part of a year practicing it. I knew what the world felt like, how it spun, how it circled and the feel of the rubber mats beneath my feet. My hands were coated in chalk and my wrists wrapped to protect them from breaking. I flew, I was flying and then I woke up here, in the ICU and it is here I have been for the last week. My body aches, my chest is tight and I hate the food.

They said it was pneumonia and a kidney infection from a UTI which I should have known would occur because of that rather unfortunate accident. And so I've sat here for nearly a week with a mild fever and a general feeling of malaise while getting IV antibiotics and food that has seen better days. I wonder if I should say I'm Jewish and keep Kosher? They have better food anyway.

Of course mom and dad couldn't be bothered to come. My mother is married to Corona and Mr. Daniels. And dad, well he had business meetings and besides Inuyasha who visits between shifts, there hasn't been anyone else. Sometimes I wonder if I throw myself in front of a bus if that would get my father out of his business meetings.

I shake the thought at the knock on the door. I smell fresh roasted meat, steamed vegetables and coffee that might still be hot and there she is and I wonder how the hell she got in here. They don't let non-family into the ICU.

She's wearing a pair of thermal leggings and a winter coat that hides her curves. "Hey big guy!" she say so cheerfully, I almost forget that I am angry with her for being attached to someone else. Her face falls at my shock, I mean, why is she here?

"Did I do something wrong? I just thought you'd like some home cooking. My sister Sango made this for dinner tonight and I thought you might like some. It's roasted lamb with carrots and mushrooms."

I feel my face breaks like an egg into a smile I am sure reaches my eyes. If she is attached to this man, he can't be that wonderful, because she is here with me, something that my ex never did.

She was supposed to come to the hospital after I was stabilized and never did. I called her many times, asking her to come, sent text messages and yet she didn't come. I left a final message when I was stable enough to be transferred from Rio back to Denver that we were finished, only for her to call me and ask when I was being sent home.

Kagura and I met while she was an intern. She was finishing her physical therapy degree and had scored a position in USAAG helping the elite gymnasts. I pulled my hamstring on the mats. Her job was therapeutic massages and stretches with the goal in mind to get us back in the game as quickly as possible.

I was always a stubborn gymnast. I didn't let injuries get in my way and she had hands like magic, a voice like a sparrow and I got lost listening to her talk. Her eyes were a heavenly shade of green and I fell hard for her. I asked her out and by the second date we woke up tangled in each other's arms. She liked classical music, hip hop and Asian food, all things I couldn't live without.

When I wasn't in the gym, we went to movies, went hiking and she became the ear that I had always needed. Her own parents were as dismissive as mine, and for once there was someone else who understood what it was like to achieve greatness and not have your family be there to praise you. I came to her graduation and clapped from the front seats and she came to as many of my competitions as her schedule would allow.

You would think a physical therapist, who by trade works with the paraplegic wouldn't have been thrown off by what happened to me, but it was all it took to break our relationship.

I had it planned out. I arranged it that during the medal ceremony I would propose. But that moment never came, because what goes up, must always come down.

After returning to Denver, I was sent to a rehab facility to learn to master driving a wheel chair. Word to the wise, it's like playing bumper cars at first. Not just that, small things like using the bathroom again became a chore. My legs were dead weights and after a month in bed, my arms were deconditioned and let's face it, my attitude has never made things easier. I went from being able to swing my body five feet in the air, to barely able to get out of bed. I had to learn to sit up again, just like an infant. And I did it alone.

Kagura didn't show up until I went home and I use that term lightly. It was a small house I lived in with my mother. Not the sprawling home we own now with the double sized backyard and the garden that feeds my soul. Kagura told me that she was sorry and she wanted to try again but after failing to understand that I couldn't have sex normally anymore, didn't always have control of my bladder or fecal matter and that my attitude and finances had dried up, she found a man named Naraku and from there I don't know.

I got lost in having my house built to fit a wheel chair, extra wide doors so I didn't get stuck, multiple bathrooms and at the end of the day, if I wasn't on disability and didn't receive Medicaid, I'm not entirely sure how I would pay the bills. Just imagine this, previous Olympic gold medalist receives SNAP benefits. I'm a joke. Even I know that.

"Have you been listening to me?" Rin asks me. Her eyebrows knit together like two perfect pearls. Somehow she has taken all the food out for me, arranged it on my tray, put the tray in front of me and is sitting by my feet with her own stretched up against my hips, that I of course do not notice, because I can't feel them.

"Every word," I lie, because I don't want to tell her the truth.

"Really?" She raises an eyebrow and I swear I want to kiss her right then and there, but I can't reach that far down the bed. Then I wonder what the hell is wrong with me. "What was I saying?"

"You were talking about…" my eyes dart down to her lips and my tongue drags across my own cracked lips at the thought of really kissing her. It's been so long since I have tasted a woman in more than dreams.

She gets closer, leaning her elbows on my tray, her chin juts out enough that I can feel the warmth of her breath tickling m skin. "I was saying?" She shakes her head back and forth mischievously. Would it be wrong if I leaned just a little more forward and…

She pulls back laughing. "Are you going to eat the lamb? It's really good. Sango makes it with fresh basil and parsley and then spends the entire day roasting it. She's kind of like you and me. We were a family of athletes. She used to fence before, well…before she was saddled with raising me and my brother."

"Your brother?" Did I know she had a brother?

"Yeah, you saw him at the restaurant sitting next to me."

"Your…brother?" I stammer out? I'm such an idiot. Was that the man I thought had stolen her heart?

"Yeah, Kohaku. He's three years older than me. We go out to eat or eat in once a week. Family thing that we do."

"Brother."

"I just said that." She's obviously confused with my repetition but my throat is too dry and dear god I think I have risen to the occasion, so I defensively pull the tray tighter over my hips to hide it. "Are you okay?"

"Of course."

Her hand flies to my forehead, then glides down my face lingering on my cheek. "What are these?"

"A fashion statement." I pull her hand off the magenta stripes on my cheeks out of annoyance. After the accident ruined my career, I figured why not make a statement? You can't hide a crescent moon on your forehead or angry stripes on your cheeks any more than you can hide a wheel chair.

"They're cute." She relaxes on the bed as if she owns it, tucking her bare feet against my hip and I wonder when she had time to take her shoes off. There is a pair of petite flats next to the bed. "Are you going to eat?"

It suddenly dawns on me I haven't touched the food in front of me and then I finally start eating and I swear my stomach starts growling from finally getting real food. It's odd having someone in the hospital with me.

Inuyasha visited me in rehab often. At least once a day, sometimes twice. He went from spending lunches with his classmates or his wife to eating with me. That was until we made the arrangement that saves them money on sending Kieran to school and gives me something to do that makes me feel like I am still worth something. Which is why it's odd that I have a visitor in the room with me. "Did you see the one where Stabler and Olivia had to choose between each other and the job?" she asks me.

"It hasn't shown. I'm not much of an SVU lover except for when I'm in hospital."

"I watched a ton of it when I was in the hospital with my knee. Now I watch it religiously."

"Why are you here Rin?"

"Do you want me to leave?"

Great, now I've made her face fall and I am certain there are tears pricking at the corner of her eyes. This is so annoying, I'm the one that's the patient and now I must comfort her. "Why are you here?"

"Well," she chews on her bottom lip. "I was worried about you." Her eyes fall and she twiddles her thumbs in her lap. Maybe she does care about me. "You didn't come and you've been making such good progress." Nope…just another case of someone feeling bad for me. "Well," she keeps going, "and I was really worried about you. I told the front that I'm your physical therapist and you asked me for a consultation. I have rights at this hospital anyway, so it worked out."

I find myself searching for her feet and for reasons I don't understand, I start massaging the balls and her eyes roll into the back of her head, encouraging me.

"Wow you are good at that."

"Are you in pain?"

"I'm a physical therapist. I spend eight hours a day on my feet, sometimes twelve. They hurt like hell."

"So he was your brother? The man that you were with inside the restaurant and on the bus?"

"So you did see me on the bus?" She covers her face with her hands and the most adorable shade of pink paints her cheeks.

"Well, at least I know you aren't dating anyone," I say haughtily and then add, "you aren't dating anyone?"

"Nope. I have been male free for the last three months," her voice pitches as if being single is something to be proud of. Although if it is, I have been single for nearly four years and yet I still miss her and wonder what would have been had I not fallen that day. "Are you okay Sesshomaru?"

I taste some of the vegetables between massaging her feet, they are fresh, still crunchy and remind me oddly of when my mother used to cook. That was long ago, before the bottle became her best friend. "Where did you get the vegetables?"

"Farmers Market. I go shopping for Sango because of the twins. They're six months old and it's hell for her. I get the fruits and veg once a week and Kohaku gets the rest. Sometimes we borrow their car and do the Costco runs. Miroku works crazy hours. It's what we do to help."

"A close knit family?"

"I guess so, if you're comparing it to others. What about you?"

"As if you haven't read it in the multiple files and reports."

"I read a fair bit, but you seem close to your brother, that's good and your nephew is adorable."

I want to laugh at the cruelty of it all that my mother and father are both alive and not in this room. I saw dear old Dad for the first time in the rehab facility in Denver. I had just finished a rather vigorous round of physical therapy, back when I believed it was worth it and that I would defy the odds and walk again.

I was wheeling down one of the halls to get to my room and found him standing outside the door, pacing as if his life depended on the steps he was taking. His shoes made an uncomfortable squeak which was almost more painful to listen to than it was to see that he was dressed in one of his most expensive Brooks Brothers suits.

You would think that the conversation would have revolved around how I was feeling, when I would be leaving and the like, but the first thing he said was, "At least now you'll give up this ridiculous sport, a shame it took something like this to wake you up."

I asked him what he was doing there. He said he was visiting but couldn't stay long because he had a meeting. There was some lame excuse made for why he hadn't come to see me sooner. Something about having a company to run and it should be enough that my mother was there and what happened to the girl I was dating? The conversation ended with me slamming the door in his face and I'm fairly certain having my first panic attack. My chest felt as tight then as it does now.

I had no plans after finishing rehab. He assumed I would go into business, or go to college, but all I wanted was to get back on the mats. But as time passed, and my pain got worse, and the swelling in my back went down, yet no feeling or movement returned, I soured.

All we did was fight and argue and after a year my father cut me off financially. Hence living with my alcoholic mother. She pays half the bills and the rest of my house was financed by USA Gymnastics out of charity. Imagine going from being on a Wheaties box to being a charity case.

"Where did you go just now?" Rin asks me.

"I haven't left."

"You know what I mean. What were you thinking about?"

"Are you really just visiting me?" I try to distract her. The last thing I want to do is talk about my relationship with my father, or my mother.

"Truth?"

"Of course I want the truth." Somehow I've cleared the entire plate of food sitting in front of me and haven't noticed it. God, real food tastes good.

"Well then you have to tell me the truth first. Look, you know recovery is mental too. You can't tell me you don't have some underlying angst, and anxiety, anger…"

"Any other 'A' disorders?"

"You know what I mean."

I nod because it's true. "My father looks at me as a failure, a waste of time. I'm fairly certain that he was relieved, excited even when I was injured. As you can see, I don't have family coming in and out of this room." The words are so bitter, they sting my own mouth.

"You're lonely," she says as if she knows what is in my heart. "Thank you, for sharing that with me. It has to be really hard for you, dealing with all of this and not having his approval."

"The worst." I lift myself up enough to shift my weight and then break into a coughing fit. I hate nasal cannulas but I can't breathe without it. My sats were low when I came in and apparently I passed out at the restaurant. One more humiliation.

"I thought you could use a friend," she tells me with a guilty look in her eyes. "I'm not really supposed to have relationships with anyone outside of work but you and me—"

"We're similar?"

"Yeah. Maybe I should go."

"No." I catch her by the ankle to keep her from leaving. "I like the company."

"How long are you stuck here for? You still look ill."

"ICU? Another day at most, but then probably a week in inpatient care. Pneumonia and kidney infection."

"You gotta take the gold every time?" Her voice changes and she stifles a laugh and before I know it, I'm laughing with her.

For a while we talk and I find out more about her and why she decided to become a physical therapist. She even offers to give me a massage that I would be a fool to refuse. It's harder getting on your stomach when you feel like garbage and have a nasal cannula in your nose, but she settles for getting me on my side and then her hands work magic on my back and if she makes me groan anymore, everyone outside is going to think we're having sex. Which somehow, makes me imagine her with her clothing off and if her skin is as pale as it seems. Trust me, I am praying to everything holy, when she helps me turn to my other side and starts kneading my hips like a piece of bread that she doesn't notice the pipe between my legs. "Oh god," I groan out, gripping the side of the bed. "You are so good at this."

"I've had years of practice," she says as her hands pull the side of my white tank-top up. Her hands skate across my back and side until she gets to the knots in my lower back. "Does it hurt here?"

"Like a bitch." I try to focus on anything but how it begins to flare with pain. Another gift of paralysis, I can't feel anything below my navel, but I can feel the pain of my straining muscles. "My god, Rin."

"That good huh?"

"Yes."

I'm so lost in the feel of her hands on my skin that I don't notice when the door opens, until her hands stop and when I look at her, she looks like she is seeing an apparition of her past.

"Am I interrupting something?" he asks as he taps the floating desk he's brought in. "Rin?"

And then I wonder, how this mother fucker knows her and why she looks like she has just seen a ghost.

"Hey Bya," her voice comes out nervously.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment and Kudo!!


	9. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin asks Byakuya for help with Sesshomaru's case but the price may not be worth it in the end.

**Rin**

Fuck…fuck oh fuck! Byakuya and I dated for six months and we just broke up. Well, we broke up three months ago, when I was still in grad school.

We met at a mixer for singles on campus. He had just finished his first year as an intern and had decided to specialize in neurology. He was a looker, I'll give him that. Thick black hair that was just long enough to run my fingers through and then some. He was a smooth talker who always said the right things, doted on me, big gifts and made me feel like a princess.

He asked me to dance, and I got dizzy from the spinning chandelier and flashing lights and nearly passed out. He helped me out of the party and we walked back to my place. Kohaku hated him from the start. He thought he was trying to put the moves on me, which he was, but I thought he wasn't like other guys who had thrown themselves at me.

"Bya…" I fall off the bed grabbing my shoes. Did I mention we didn't exactly part on good terms? I told him that I found someone else and it was like three months ago and I'm betting right now he thinks Sesshomaru is that someone else.

"Rin?" He walks straight up to me and hugs me, kissing my cheek. If looks could kill, we would both be dead. Sesshomaru's eyes are hard, the edges are dark brown instead of honey.

"You know Dr. Wister?" Sesshomaru asks me.

"Um…yeah we…"

"Were friends…" Byakuya stumbles over his words.

"In college…and…"

"It's been a while. How are you?"

"Great!" I lie, nervously tucking my hair behind my ear. "Great. I'm uh…visiting Sesshomaru."

"I see that."

"You don't have to act as if I am not in the room," Sesshomaru snipes.

"You're his physical therapist? I saw that on the notes. His muscle strength is looking much better," Byakuya speaks rapidly.

"Please, talk in front of me about my progress." Sesshomaru's arms are folded and flexing. Great, I'm in so much trouble. Unless he signs a release I'm not even supposed to have conversations in front of other people, medical staff or not and I don't know if he did.

"Oh god, I'm so sorry Sesshomaru. I'll," I grab my coat and my bag, "I'll just go."

"I didn't say leave." Sesshomaru can't reach my hand but I recognize the gesture.

"Byakuya needs to talk to you and I…I should go." I bolt out of the room but can't help but stop and listen by the door. I shouldn't be doing this, but the way hospitals are built these days there are trapped doors on the other side of the wall to pull out waste baskets. Although I have a pretty clear picture of his condition, I can hear Bya telling him on the other side, that he needs to make sure that he is participating in therapy, that they were concerned about clots and that his lungs are weakened from not exercising. However, because of the work he has done with me, his strength is coming back and Bya would like it to continue.

As soon as Byakuya exits the room, I grab him by the arm and take him down the halls until I find one that is empty. "Can he qualify for nerve transplant therapy?"

"That's not really my job. I'm just on call here for emergent cases with neurologic diagnosis." He pull his arm out of mine hard enough to jolt me.

"Bya come on, please?"

"What is this about Rin? Is this the guy you dumped me for?"

And I'm caught. What's the truth on top of hurt feelings? "I lied okay. I said I was dating someone else because I…"

"What?" Bya looms over me, in all his masculinity. I suddenly feel very small, which was another reason I needed out. I back up until my shoulders hit the wall. I'm not going to back down this time.

"Look, some people just aren't meant to be okay?"

"And you're meant for him?"

"He's my patient, not my boyfriend."

"Then why were you in his room?"

"Because I was worried about him. But you don't understand, he was a world class athlete. I'm surprised he hasn't wheeled himself in front of a train. Would it work on him?"

"It's still in the experimental phases for back injuries, Rin."

"Exactly! Experimental! You could experiment on him!"

"And if it doesn't work?"

"Then at least you tried! God Bya! Is this the kind of Doctor you've become? Why can't you at least get the big guys up there to look at it? Look at him? Please?"

"And what do I get if I do?" I should have known that was coming.

"I'm not performing anything…on you…" I back away but the wall is stopping me from escaping. I swear it wouldn't be beyond this guy to ask me to do something like that.

"A date. Go on a date with me and I'll pass his file onto the doctors doing the experimental procedure."

I grit my teeth, grinding them together and kick the wall. "It's not going to change things between us."

"Give me a chance Rin and I'll give him one." He runs his hands through my hair making me shiver, not because I like it.

My stomach cramps, because if I'm honest with myself, I am crushing on Sesshomaru. He's cute, in that old man way, especially when he is grumpy and mad. In therapy that's when he tries the hardest. It's then his inner athlete comes out and no matter what I do, I'll always be attracted to a man who can turn muscle into an art form.

"Fine, one date and that's it. You get him to the top of the pile."

"Deal." Bya holds his hand out and with it my pride. "You have to convince him to."

"Tell me if it's possible first."

"That's against policy."

"So bend it."

"You want me to bend HIPPA?"

"Yeah I do. Tell me the chances it will work and I'll convince him to sign the releases."

"Fine. Friday, noon, Café Suave on Main Street," Byakuya says as he walks away.

As Bya leaves, a black ball of guilt forms in my stomach. I had come to visit my patient, got an amazing foot rub and now a date with some guy that I don't actually care about. There's a part of me that wants to just go into his room and lay one on him just so I don't feel the way I do right now, but I'm already dancing on that line between patient and professional.

I call Jak that night and tell him what I did to get Sesshomaru looked at which is almost as good as telling Bankotsu. He agrees to keep my secret and not tell his big brother on me so I can keep this job, but now he's worried I'm too _invested_. That isn't really the issue. It's just that I know what it's like to be on the top and fall. The only difference is that I was able to get back up. "You are the one that said to call him Jak!"

"Call him, not ask for a consult without the proper documentation for the price of a date, with some dude you don't want to go out with in the first place! Why didn't you just ask Sesshomaru out on a date?"

"Because I'm a coward and I don't want to get put into a situation I don't want to be in again! With someone who wants what I'm not ready to give!" I nearly yell into the phone. "You know this is ridiculous…"

"You still having a cherry is ridiculous."

"I told you to pop it!"

"Oh honey get someone who really likes the oven to pop that dumpling. We're friends and I'd rather keep it that way."

"Fine."

"Tell me how a twenty five year old still has a cherry in the first place. You trying to be Shirley Temple?"

"That's not even funny. You know my story. I went to college at fifteen. How sexy is that? Jailbait? Then I was so damn busy in grad-school. It's not like I haven't had anyone use their fingers, I just never wanted to go all the way."

"Just get a dildo."

"Jak."

"What? It fits."

"You would know."

"I would not."

"I'm not talking about having sex and how did we even get on this topic!"

"You tell me baby, I'm over here in my hello kitty pajamas watching reruns of Oprah and now I need to call my boyfriend."

"I give up."

"No you don't. Just tell the dude what you did. When's he getting out of the hospital?"

"Another week."

"That's no good. You have to go back and don't make me remind you that Bya is bad news."

"I know. But it's just a date and I can handle one date with him."

"You think you can handle one date."

That's how I find myself walking back through the hospital. This time I dared to try his cell phone and he actually answered and let me know which room he was in. He was moved from the ICU to the sick ward. We got the call in the morning to have one of our physical therapists, me that is, work with him. I'm such an idiot. I know this whole thing with Byakuya is a bad idea. But here I am, trying to make this situation right.

Hospital food can be the worst so this time I'm bringing him some cinnamon buns, scrambled eggs and hash browns. Kohaku and I went a bit crazy this morning cooking and decided to make one of everything and then dropped it off at Sango and Miroku's.

I asked if I could come bright and early around seven thirty, because let's face it, I have to work at nine in the morning today, so I don't have a lot of time. I run up the stairs so I don't have to wait for the elevator and thank goodness I've been skating almost every morning from six to seven, because my legs don't feel the burn of going up five flights of stairs and I barely break a sweat.

"Knock, knock!" I call into the room before I open the door. It's empty but I can hear noise in the bathroom. I knock on that too. "Hey, it's Rin."

"A moment please," he tells me. I go sit on the couch and turn the TV on. USA is a great station. It has all the best reruns on it. I settle back watching Elliot Stabler trying to make a crook crack. "Stupid bitch!" I yell with him. I've seen this episode so many times. I swear USA is a religion when you're in the hospital all the time.

Sesshomaru comes out of the bathroom, wearing a bathrobe, wheeling himself next to the bed. "Hey, you look better," I tell him.

"IV antibiotics will help with that," he says coolly. I know I'm in trouble. "Breakfast?" He lifts up the containers that I brought him.

"Hospital food sucks. Really, you should say you're Jewish. Kosher food is amazing. I lied once and asked for the kosher menu and it was incredible."

"I'm surprised you aren't off chasing that attractive doctor."

I bite my bottom lip. "About that…um…"

"You two are a pair again?"

"No—"

"You slept with him and want to share the details?" He arches his eyebrows. I never noticed how thick and colorful they were before.

"No—"

"Then what are you doing here? As you can see, I don't often get guests, if you don't count my brother who will join me for lunch."

He lets his robe fall open. I swear a fire lights between my legs. His muscles are coming back and before I know it, I'm staring at the way the lines come down his stomach, the pale white of his skin and what are those on his hips? Stripes? He really did have fun with his fashion statement.

"You act like this is the first time you've seen me naked."

"Do you want me to turn around?"

"Do you want to turn around?" He starts getting dressed in loose fitting clothes like a pro and then swings himself into his bed. "Why are you here?" He starts sorting through the breakfast I brought him, coughing. Poor guy, he really took a hit with all this.

"Because I'm an idiot and I'm in trouble and I need your help?" I walk forward wringing my hands. "Truth sucks sometimes…okay…so that guy Byakuya? Dr. Wister, um we dated for a while and broke up three months ago. I lied and told him I was dating someone else. Not you," I wave my hand around to stop him from speaking. "But, I asked him to share your file with his colleagues without your permission. He's a neurologist and part of a team that is studying the effects of nerve transplant therapy."

"It's a waste of time."

If gold could harden into ice, it's the way his eyes have become and I swear I'm shaking in my shoes. "Look, I could get fired for this okay?"

"You should be! I didn't ask you to send my file off. What did you expect to come of this?!"

Each time his voice rises I feel like someone is hacking into my stomach with a saw. "I don't know. It was stupid. I shouldn't have and that isn't even the worst part," my voice finally breaks and wipe my eyes. "I said I would go on a date with him if he did."

"Why the hell would you do that?" His voice is so deep and so masculine, it vibrates into the core of my being.

"Because I care about you!" I cover my mouth and hide my face.

"You care about me?" he asks incredulously. "You barely know me. You're my physical therapist!"

"I know that you are stronger than you give yourself credit for and that you're so smart and that at night you dream of walking again, of competing and it kills you to be stuck in that chair!"

"It's none of your business!"

"It is my business! I wouldn't have asked if I didn't believe they could help you and if I didn't…"

"Didn't what?" he asks me more soberly.

I come forward nervously and sit on the bed next to him, taking his hand. "I go home thinking about you, wondering if you're okay. Or if this depression that is eating at you is going to make you take your life, because I know Sesshomaru, I do. But that's where we're different." I scoot closer to his chest. "I can get up. You can't. I care about you."

He shakes his head. I think I see sadness and something else cross his eyes. He takes my hands first and then pulls me into his chest. I sit there, listening to the beating of his heart, the strong thud of an athlete.I've never felt more complete or more whole. My arm slides up his chest. I smell his skin. He smells like the forest and pine and somehow I fit perfectly against his side. I curl against him, finding warmth in his embrace. "You're shaking," he mutters. "Are you cold?"

"It's negative outside, but no. I'm just, you don't know Bya."

"I've met him a few times."

"You never dated him."

"You don't have to do this."

"It's just a date."

I swallow hard and sit up. Our eyes meet. "I also brought the consent forms for us to treat you here. I'm new but I have rights here. If you want me, I'll come work with you this week. We'll keep it light."

"Only you." He cups my cheek.

I hold his palm against my face and shake my head. "I can't. I'm sorry."

"Basketball."

"What?"

"I want to play basketball and drive."

I start laughing and lean over to gather the papers. "I can help with that."

"Rin," he asks and it's his eyes that kill me, "if I weren't your patient and we had met on different terms, would you still say no?"

"No," even I am surprised at how quickly I answer. But it's true, the disability doesn't matter to me. "I see you." Suddenly our voices are very low and his lips are so close to mine.

He sits up straighter, moving closer. I can smell his breath, hear the sound of the nasal cannula moving air into his lungs. I lick my lips nervously as he brings me closer, but then someone knocks on the door. I back away, off the bed, back to being a professional. _I can't_ , I mouth. He nods and starts signing the papers. "I'll see you later then."

By the time work is over Jak and I are sitting at a burger place, because I'm starving. Ginkotsu had to leave early so Ban asked me to cover his hours. My feet are killing me again, my legs hurt and my arms are sore. I order two gigantic burgers, fries and a salad to fill the void in my stomach. "How are you going to eat all that?" Jak asks me.

"Eawy," I answer with a mouth full of meat. I haven't been this hungry since I competed. The rate at which I burned calories on the ice and had to eat a rounded diet made it so that I had muscles but I was constantly hungry. I lean back against the seat and Jak sips his soup, giving me a knowing look.

"I can't believe you agreed to go on a date with that asshole after what he did to you and you sit here and tell me you aren't too involved. Trust me, puddles is not worth all of this."

"Would you stop calling him that! You have no idea what it's like to be on the top and then fall, literally and break your body so badly you can't go back. And," I hold up a finger and take a giant bite of french-fries, "in his case, to the point that you can't even walk again." I swallow the giant lump of fries and chug the soda next to me.

"You're making me sick." Jak rolls his eyes. "You eat like that and you are going to gain another thirty pounds. How much you weigh now anyway?"

"Jak—"

"Oh come on! Hundred fifty, hundred forty?"

"One hundred and thirty but when I was competing I was in the one twenties."

"You gotta try again." Jak picks up his coffee and takes a big drink and then takes a pastry, dipping it in the drink.

"To compete? No way. You have no idea. I can't afford it and I can't do this to my family. They worked so hard for me to get here and if I go back, then that means they have to support me again—"

"Then get a sponsor."

"No one is going to sponsor a has been."

"We would," he says so somberly it gives me shivers.

"You mean Band of Seven?" I drop my glass on the table, nearly spilling it all over my lap.

"Yeah. We talked about it. We're in if you are. You want to compete we're behind you."

I bury my head in my hands. "Do you have any idea what I would have to do to get back in shape? Training, ballet, skating, running. I'd have to drop at least fifteen pounds—"

"Which isn't gonna happen with you masticating that much cow," he points out.

"I don't know. Why would you guys want to sponsor me?"

"Ban wants to be the lead in sports medicine and sponsoring an athlete gets our name out there. Plus, you get our services free. You'd kick ass. You'll be like Oksana Chusovitna."

"Don't tell me that." That is a world class gymnast who has gone to every Olympic competition for the last twenty years. She's in her forties and can still give her younger counterparts a run for their money. I start massaging my temples feeling stressed. "Just get me through this date with Bya."

"I hope you made it in a public place and don't you dare go back to his room with him."

"I don't plan on it. We're going to Café Suave on Friday. One date and that's it."

"You say that now."

"How much does this surgery cost anyway?"

"Fifty thousand dollars."

"God, there's no way he could pay for that."

Bya and I hit off right away, that should have been the first warning that something wasn't right. I mean, how many people meet someone who agrees with everything they say? When you are young and don't have a lot of dating experience, it's like walking on cloud nine.

Our first date was to Café Suave a swanky place in downtown Denver. He had a tea and I had a mochaccino. I was going to be up late anyway studying. We talked about movies, art, dancing and then he finally got it that I wasn't just Rin Matthews, Grad-school student but the former Olympic Athlete and he really wanted to know everything about me. Of course I shared, why wouldn't I?

We kissed on the second date and things started getting heated after that. I let him take me to bed but I always stopped short of doing more than heavy petting sessions. At first it was because I wasn't on birth control but then it was because I wasn't ready to have sex at all. I wanted to feel something more than what I did the first time and Bya was my first real boyfriend.

A few months in, things started changing between us. He wanted to know where I was all the time, who I was with. He got pissed when Kohaku would invite over his bandmates and we'd all watch a movie. He didn't like that I was around other men. He'd call to make sure I was home when I said, or follow me to school the morning.

I started having trouble sleeping. He wanted to be with me all the time. Kohaku started making up excuses for me but it was six months in I knew I needed to get out. We got into a fight.

I was going to Sango and Miroku's for dinner like we do every week and he wanted me to go out with him. I told him no. Then he demanded that we make love because we had waited long enough. I refused, the argument got heated and the next thing I knew, I had an angry red mark across my left cheek and he was on the floor cupping his junk.

I went home and skipped dinner that night, setting off alarms within my family. Kohaku threatened to kill him, Miroku put a potato in Bya's tailpipe. I told him the real reason I didn't want him to come along with me was that I had found someone else.

So you can imagine that I am not looking forward to this date on Friday morning. I must be insane if I'm willing to go on a date just to get Sesshomaru to the top of the pile of potential candidates. If he can even get on the radar, but maybe it's because I am terrified that he is going to roll himself in front of a train and in the three weeks we've known each other, I could see him doing it. He misses his old life.

It's why I'm distracted when I visit him in the hospital first thing in the morning before I leave to go on this ridiculous date. We start by doing stretches that are meant to increase his range of motion and then I work with him on tightening his core. We start with simple things like sit ups and stretching, touches his toes. For my part, I stretch the tendons and ligaments in his legs and then massage his ankles and knees to keep them limber. After that, we start the passive exercises again.

His chart says the fever has been gone for a few days and they're hoping he can go home sooner than the original week they had wanted. I bring him ice water to help clear the cough. He drinks it and asks me, "so you landed a double?"

"What?"

"You landed a double?"

"Yeah." I bring him a wet towel to sluice the sweat off is skin. "I've done a few. Double axel, double toe-loop, double lutz. It's a bit clumsy getting back into it, but I remember the movements."

"Are you going to compete again?" He groans, leaning forward to touch his toes again.

"Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

"Once an athlete, always an athlete."

"I've thought about it. I don't have time to train. I can't."

"Can't or won't?"

"Why do you care?"

"The same reason you care about me."

That makes my insides twist uncomfortably. I've managed to make it through this week without thinking about our encounter on Sunday and how we almost kissed and if I take this anywhere but friends, I could get fired. "Are you saying you care about me?"

"I think we both know what it's like to miss flying and to miss the roar of the crowd when you land that jump perfectly, knowing you were the best."

"Yeah." I close my eyes, remembering the first time I landed a quad. I was in the rink with Kaede and I had fallen so many times, my ass was constantly sore but that time, I went up, got all the rotations in and landed it, perfectly. "Come on, let's get you cooled off. You did really good this time."

He shrugs his shoulders. I know he wants to throw some sardonic comment to stay ahead but for once he keeps it to himself.

He gets on his stomach. I start the cool down massage starting with his feet and ankles. This time, I use a thick cream to care for the cracked skin and I'm pleased to feel his muscles more supple than they were before we started working together.

He sniffs the air. "Is that mint?"

"Your toes are dry."

"I never pay much attention, paralyzed."

Once I get up to his lower back he starts sighing in contentment and for me, it's a game of how many times I can make him moan. My thumbs dig into his spine, loosening the ligaments, stretching his skin. The groans and moans come out steadily. "You must have been in so much pain before."

"It always hurt."

"And now?"

"It's not nearly as bad. I should thank you."

"I'm just doing my job."

To that he laughs. Of course he's right. Doing your job means, doing your job, not going on a date with an ass of an ex so that I can get his name to the top of the pile. Nerve transplant therapy is amazing. The potential, once they pass this round of trials means that paraplegics like Sesshomaru could have a chance to walk again and if not that, at least have a chance to feel some sensation below the injury point.

They do it by splicing nerves from other areas and reconnecting them, or just rerouting them altogether. Kind of like how you would move past a broken circuit in a computer. Once it has a chance to adapt, it begins to regenerate but in his case, it's not like he would wake up one day walking. It starts with getting feeling back in the limbs slowly and then we have four years of muscle loss to make up for to even get him out of the chair and that all depends on how hard he's willing to work, if it works at all.

"You're quiet for once." His fingers curl around mine when I get to his neck. His hair is braided today, so it's easier to move off his shoulders.

"Just thinking."

"About?"

"You talk this much to all your therapists?"

"Usually I insult them until they cry. But that only worked once on you."

"I don't take it personally. I've seen it so many times before." I slide down his biceps and start working on the callouses on his hands.

"Where have you been all my life?" he mutters out, groaning in solace.

"That good huh?" I put pressure on his joints to loosen them up.

"Yes."

"I bet I could have done some work on those callouses you got when you were active before. You know what I always wanted to learn how to do? A hand stand. I could jump and twirl with the best of them, but no matter how hard I tried, I could never learn to do a hand stand or a flip."

"Maybe I'll coach you."

"Maybe I'll let you." I sit down next to him, while he pushes himself onto his back and scoots back up the bed, raising the head. "I heard you're getting out soon."

"Tonight as long as I continue to breathe well."

"You know that would be easier if you weren't exposed to second hand smoke."

"And here comes the doctor." He starts knuckling his forehead. I know I've overstepped. It's problematic and written in his charts that he lives with his mother who is married to the bottle and chain smokes.

"Technically I do have a PhD—"

"You know that's not what I meant."

"I'm only—"

"Trying to help? Just like everyone who tries to help? Who tries to make it better? You can't fix, broken."

"Your back broke, not you."

"Don't feed me that bullshit."

"It's not bullshit it's the truth. You are still here, even if you don't want to be."

"And you think you're going to be the one to save me?"

"No." I stand up and fold my arms and stare at my toes. "I'm just your physical therapist. Let me know if you're going to be home tomorrow. I'll see if we can't get someone to come to your house until you can come back to Band of Seven." Sometimes deep breaths is all you can do. He doesn't answer me, so I gather my things and start cleaning them with soap and water and then head out.

I tripped on my own skates. That's how I fell. I've probably watched the video a hundred times. I even had Kohaku get one of his techy friends to zoom in on my legs so I could see what went wrong. My feet got tangled when I came down and twisted my knee and that's how I ended up with the bad break. I don't remember a lot of what happened once it was broken. I screamed a lot, because it was the worse pain I had ever felt and then I blacked out.

I woke up in the hospital. My leg was in a brace and Sango and Miroku were next to me. I knew it was bad. Sango broke the news to me that I would have to have parts of my knee replaced. Miroku in typical fashion had me laughing through the tears of knowing I wouldn't be going to the Olympics now. Kohaku played me some sick tune on his guitar, something he said he made up to get me through the rough patch.

When I got to leave the hospital and go to rehab and learn to use my leg again, I said the same thing, I'm broken. But that's when the therapist reminded me, my knee was broken, not me. I still could do whatever I wanted, except for what I wanted, which was to skate. I convinced myself for a good half year or so that I was going to get my strength back but then I stepped foot on the ice and that was it. I had a panic attack so bad that Kaede had to call an ambulance and after that, before a few weeks ago I never skated again.

I run home first to change my clothes so I'm wearing something half decent before I meet Byakuya at Café Suave. I go for comfortable over seductive. Not to mention it's freezing outside so that leaves me in thick wool pants and a cashmere sweater that hangs off my shoulders and then piles of layers, because it's been nothing but single digits and negatives.

We meet outside. He holds the door open for me. He orders his regular stick up your ass coffee, black and some kind of protein sandwich, while I binge on a chocolate brownie with fudge topping and a caramel macchiato because I have to make it through a twelve hour shift again. "You're going to gain more weight with that."

"That is none of your business," I tell him quickly. Something else he was always into, how big his girlfriend was. He wanted me to try to slim down, lose a few pounds. I don't care that I'm pushing a hundred and forty pounds.

"All that sugar, you're going to become a diabetic."

"I didn't come here for health advice Bya. I came because you wanted to talk. So let's talk."

"You know I always hated it when you called me that."

"Sorry," I say it but I don't meant it. Food. I love food. I spent so much time competing, always on some diet or another. High veg, high protein, low carb and fats. I had to keep slim and aerodynamic and trust me anorexia is common among skaters. But here's the thing, you need muscle to jump and land and you can't build muscle if you don't eat.

"So you finally graduated?"

"A few months ago. I landed a job at Band of Seven."

"With that guy Jakotsu?"

"Yeah."

"Interesting." His eyes harden. He was always jealous of Jakotsu, even if Jakotsu is gay.

"Is that the one then?"

"No."

"Then who was it?"

"I told you I lied."

"I don't believe it. There had to be someone."

"There wasn't."

"What if I said a date wasn't enough?"

My mouth dries out and that's when my heart starts fluttering and I feel the panic starting to rise. This was a bad idea, a very bad idea. "I would say that we'll just have to find the money then."

"He doesn't have money. Medicaid case."

"I'm not sleeping with you Bya." _Shit,_ I'm about to reach into my phone, but that's when I realize that it's not there and I'm stuck with this guy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> COMMENT COMMENT COMMENT...OH AND KUDO PLEASE :)


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello All!! So glad to give you this chapter!
> 
> Sesshomaru finds out Rin is in trouble. Rescuing her doesn't quite go as planned but his efforts aren't wasted!

**Sesshomaru**

The first time I saw my mother after I was injured was in the hospital in Rio de Janeiro. Fancy this, we were both patients. She was recovering from consuming enough alcohol to subdue a man three times her size and I was still attached to a ventilator, wondering if I would ever get off of it. By that point, some feeling had returned to my fingers, so when I felt icy vines, curl themselves into my fingers, I opened my eyes to see my mother.

Her eyes were puffy and red. Obvious signs she had been crying. She lifted my fingers to her lips and kissed them, as if she was kissing a booboo and mother's magic kiss would make it heal like magic. She swore to me that if I healed she would get sober. She would never touch a drop of alcohol again. I knew better than to believe that.

She was with me when I was transferred to Denver Medical and eventually to the rehab facility. She visited daily, drunk and disoriented. A social worker came and asked me if I had made arrangements for when I returned home. Dear old dad, he thought I would move back in with him. Inuyasha offered his home with Kagome but I couldn't burden them and then there was mom. She promised to learn everything necessary to take care of me. In the beginning it was a lot. I didn't even know how to care for myself.

Imagine the first embarrassing moment a male nurse comes in and helps you cath yourself. I felt like a pregnant woman that has to get used to the doctors invading her vagina, only it was men holding my penis, and directing a stiff tube inside so I could relieve myself.

I was assigned a home health aide, Nichole. This chubby thing in her early twenties who was working to pay for nursing school, who had _seen it all._ The last thing you want to hear as someone else is changing you like an infant is how she never thought she would get to work on an ex-Olympic athlete. She threw the word ex-athlete and ex-Olympian around enough to make me sick. Refusing to follow her directions almost became a game for me. Nichole is where I learned how to dig just enough to draw tears, to scare the staff off. And let's be honest, it's easier when your mother wipes your ass after an accident than some college drop out.

Mom never did keep her promise to quit drinking, but then again I never healed completely either, so we're both failures.

But it's not the same with Rin. When she asked about why I live with my mother, I know that she knows what I have experienced and what I have had to give up.

I'm deep in thought when I hear a buzzing on the desk next to the bed and see a phone that doesn't belong to me. I pick it up and see Kohaku Taijiya on the screen. She left her phone. Next he texts something along the lines of 'where are you?'. I set the phone down and dig around my side for my own. I might as well call Band of Seven and let them know that she left her phone here. Before I get a chance, the phone starts ringing again and another message comes through. You'd think her brother would know that she is working.

The third time it rings I pick it up and answer for her. "This is Sesshomaru Takahashi."

"What are you doing with my sister's phone?"

"I'm her patient. She left it at the hospital."

"Which one, I'll come get it."

"Denver Medical. I'm on the third floor. Room 316."

"Where is she? I got a call from her job, she's late."

"On a date," I supply, knowing that perchance I should not have but in the end this might be fun to get her in trouble with her family. It's the small things in life that bring me pleasure these days.

"On a date? With who? She didn't tell me she had met someone."

"It was a pity date," I gloat, because how could she land a date any other way and why if not for pity is she doing this for me.

"With who?" his voice lowers, almost as if he is threatening me, an interesting response.

"Some Neuro-surgeon resident here. Byakuya Wister."

"WHAT!?" I have to hold the phone away from my ear to avoid the yell. "Why the hell would she go out with him again!? Where did they go?"

"Why would I know that?"

"No wonder they call you puddles. You're so caught up in yourself you don't even know. I have to go before she gets hurt." The line dies and with it my appetite and the feeling in my fingers. _Before she gets hurt?_ What the hell does that mean?

I close my eyes, telling myself that this doesn't concern me, that I don't need to get involved but then again, I have her phone and if she were in trouble, it's not like she could call for help. She didn't tell me where they were going, which left me one option I knew I was going to regret.

There are things you pick up on when you are ignored because of who you have become. This is not the first time that I have seen Rin. Sure, I knew about her career but before that I had seen a girl that reminded me of her enter Band of Seven several times and almost always, she went straight to Jakotsu. She never interacted with the clients and I never put it together until the two began working together that they were friends. Very close friends.

That's what drives me to call Band of Seven and ask for the devil himself, or should I say herself? "She isn't here, Takahashi."

"I know that. Where is she?"

"Confidential. Want to leave a message?"

I grit my teeth and beat my forehead with the iPhone. "Jakotsu, she left her phone here and her brother called saying she was late."

"She's late alright," and then the line is quiet. "That's not good. She should have been here fifteen minutes ago. I told her not to go out with him."

"Where did they go?"

"Café Suave. Hey Ban! I'm taking a break!"

The lines goes dead again. I start throwing the blankets off my legs and pull my chair up to the bed. I don't bother with real shoes. Instead, I put slippers on over the thick socks and slide off the bed into the chair. What did she do?

My heart is pounding as I roll myself down the hall. "Where are you going Sesshomaru?" one of the nurses calls to me.

"For a walk."

"You can't—"

"I know I can't walk but I can go outside or is that now against the rules?" She chases after me. I don't slow down until I've exited the sick ward and head for the elevator.

"You haven't been released yet!"

"I'll be back."

"You can't leave the hospital!"

"Who said anything about leaving." I press the down button and wait impatiently. Café Suave is only a few blocks from Denver Medical. I tap my legs impatiently and get on the elevator leaving the poor nurse confused. I probably have two minutes before they call my brother and fifteen minutes after that before he uses an app on his phone to find me. He thinks I don't know that he bugged my chair to track me, but I do.

Let's just say about a year after I came home, I hit a low point. A very low point. Mother convinced me that interviews would bring in money. Everyone wants a piece of the fallen stars, even if it makes them shatter. I was being interviewed by Eileen from Sports Illustrated. The main topic was how one finds meaning after a life altering accident. I had learned long before that to ask for a written list of the questions. I started making blunders from the time I was fourteen and already making a name for myself. With an alcoholic for a mother and one of the Denver's elite business owners for a father, how could I not?

The questions started casual. How are you, what have you been up to and then it dove into what are your plans? Do you miss competing? We heard that you were going to propose and that she dumped you because you were an invalid. Have you spoken with her since? Anyone knew in your life?

Competition doesn't often lend to friendships, especially when you are an arrogant ass who knows you are the best. I was chummy with a few other athletes that conveniently forgot about me after. Then there was Kagura. For someone who worked with people like me every day, I never imagined that she would abandon me. Just like the name of her center, Wind, here one day gone the next.

I didn't know how to answer those questions because I did not have someone new. Children stared at me in the streets, afraid to come near because they might catch it. My fellow athletes looked at me with pity, afraid to tell me about their world because they wanted to spare my feelings.

My father, well he wanted me to, "just get over it already." And mom, she buried herself more deeply into the bottle than before. As for anyone new? I was still learning how to regulate my bowl movements. Who wants to sleep with someone who keeps chux pads on their bed at night? Certainly no woman I've ever met.

So the morning before the interview, I got drunk, really drunk and downed a bottle of sleeping pills. After that I heard the sound of train cars in the distance. The wail of the whistle, the clack of the wheels against the steel. It would be a quick way to go.

When I woke up, yet again I was in the hospital. This time with a black line of charcoal around my mouth and a tube in my throat again, to make sure I didn't aspirate and my brother and sister in law in tears next to my bed.

Inuyasha was heartbroken. He picked my hand up and said, "please…I'll do anything to keep you alive. I'm going to major in neurobiology. I'll find a way to fix you. You just have to live long enough for me to try."

I scoffed at first, I mean what for. You can't fix broken. But then Kagome told me that she was pregnant. They had just found out a few days before and were planning on telling everyone at the next family dinner. Kieran is why I have not tried again. That's when they started inviting me over more often, making sure I went to therapy and when I held that baby after he was born, I felt like I had something to live for. Even if I would never have a family of my own.

My lungs burn and I start coughing hard as I propel myself down the street. The pneumonia might last for another week, but that's not what I am thinking about as I make my way down the street. It seems my timing is perfect.

I find her trying to get out of his grasp. His hand has a vice grip on her upper arm and she's telling him to let her go. He takes her into an alleyway and that's when I see red. Her ankle twists. I can hear a muffled cry. I always knew I hated this guy. He was always the cocky one, with the attitude of, "I've seen a million cases like you before and if you just did as I say and worshipped the ground I walked on, everything would be perfect."

It's why I throw myself into the alleyway in time to see him slam her back first against the brick wall. She buckles under the pressure. I don't get there in time to stop the first blow to her face but by the time he raises up a second hand, I've found a pipe on the ground and slam it into his back, sending him sprawling. Don't mess with a paraplegic, what we lack in leg strength is made up for in upper body strength. "You're going to regret that Takahashi. The deals off Rin."

"I don't care," she answers, pushing herself up, cradling a split lip.

Dr. Wister storms off, leaving the scene but then she breaks. "I'm such an idiot." She slides down the brick wall, landing on her bottom and curling her knees into herself. She almost immediately starts shivering from the cold. Her hair is matted. I've never seen someone look so pathetic. Besides myself.

I roll in front of her and lock my wheels in place so I can lift her face out of her knees and try to vainly clean the cut on her lip and her cheeks from the tears. "It's okay now."

"No it's not."

"You can report him."

"No…I can't."

"Why not?"

"His father is the dean of the University I went to. It's the same reason I couldn't report him when we were dating and I had to lie to get away from him."

"Rin!" I hear two voices and then feet scampering into the alleyway.

"What the hell happened?" Jakotsu asks her. He's accompanied by the same man I saw with her at the restaurant. "And what the hell are you doing here? Oh baby that looks deep." Jakotsu's fingers pull at the skin of her lip.

Suddenly, I feel like a third wheel, which is ironic because I already have four of them. I watch and fade into the background because that is what I do best. Her brother and Jakotsu carry her away. I am left to start coughing again because of the frigid air. My fingers are freezing. I didn't even grab gloves before I left.

I can't even rescue the female properly.

I let the cold take me, let it bite at my skin, eat its way into my fingers. To be honest, I'm not even sure how long I've been in the alleyway when I hear another set of footsteps. There's my brother with a worried look on his face, reminding me that he has rotations at Denver Medical and likely one of the nurses called him when I went AWOL. "You want to tell me what happened?"

"Not really," I sigh as he takes the handles and starts wheeling me back to the hospital.

"Are you trying to kill yourself."

"Not this time."

"Then why are you out here in the cold! Goddammit Sesshomaru," his voice breaks. "Am I going to find you dead one day? I thought we were passed this."

"I wasn't trying to kill myself!" God you would think I could at least get credit for knocking that asshole off his feet.

"Then what were you doing?"

"What do you know about Dr. Wister?"

"Byakuya Wister? He's a prodigy in his field. Why?"

We enter the hospital and a gust of hot air greets me, thawing out my legs and fingers. "That's not what I meant. I mean, have there ever been any complaints from women about him?"

"What are you talking about?" He scans his access card and helps me get in my room, nodding at the nurses who I know are going to bring the doctors in as well.

"He was with Rin—"

"Physical therapist Rin?"

My back aches and so do my lungs, but I manage to get myself into the bed without his help and then I tell him what happened and his eyes change colors from gold to red. "She won't report him?" Inuyasha confirms with me.

"No. Something about who his father is."

"The dean over one of the Universities but he also sits on the medical board. Son of a bitch." Inuyasha sits down next to me. He starts playing doctor, putting his stethoscope against my chest.

I bat his hands off.

"You know I do know how to do this. Let me see how much damage you did to yourself." He raises his stethoscope to listen to my lungs again.

Animosity can only go so far. He has given up much of his life to help me. So I let him listen to my lungs, only long enough to say that I have not made them worse. "You're coming back to my house."

"No, I'm going home."

"Come on Sesshomaru, your mom—"

"I don't want to hear it. Second hand smoke, carcinogens and not conducive to recovering from pneumonia. Did I miss anything?"

"Fuck, you really do want to die, don't you?"

I break into another coughing fit, hunching over on myself. "Just leave Inuyasha. And make sure that ass hole is not on my case again."

"Fine," Inuyasha grunts out and leaves.

The rest of the day is spent with me packing my things and getting ready to go home. I have half a mind to report the ass myself, but then how much trouble can I get into for bashing him across the back? Perish the thought, resident gets his ass kicked by paraplegic. I'm about to put my sweater away when a knock comes at the door and Bankotsu pops his head inside. "What are you doing here?"

"I heard there was an incident this afternoon." He comes in and sits down as if he owns the room.

"And?"

"And I have questions." Bankotsu is a no-nonsense kind of man, who has talked me out of leaving his clinic so many times I've lost count. The only reason I have never followed through on the threat is because the only therapy center that comes close to matching Band of Seven is Wind. The last thing I want to do, is be cared for by my ex professionally, when she couldn't even manage it in a relationship. "It seems all of this has to do with getting an experimental surgery for you. Did you ask her for that?"

Suddenly I know where this is going and that Rin is skating on thinner ice than she is used to. I have two options, make myself look like an ass or cover hers that she left so blatantly bare. "How does this concern you?"

"So you're going to cover for her?" He leans back in his chair, so I lean back in mine. Two can play this game.

"I didn't say anything."

"Well then, let me say this, his father called me. It seems someone clubbed him in the back. Hard enough that he's going to miss a few days of work. And he's saying that she did it, and that she sexually harassed him in order to get you to the top of the pile of patients who want to try nerve transplant therapy."

"And what do you think?"

"I think the girl has a sweet spot for you and got herself in over her head. I've heard complaints about Dr. Wister since he was in med-school. I also know that they used to date and that I really don't want to have to take action against one of my best new hires."

"Take action?" That lying bastard. Of course he would get caught and then blame her and such a typical male response. She was asking for it, or she wanted it and in this case, she did it.

"Fire her."

There's something to be said about being able to get what you want but that's the question is, what does Bankotsu want. "What do you want out of this?"

"To avoid a lawsuit."

Smug bastard. Is that all he's worried about? But then what has all of this been for then? I won't ask her out again, but at least we can be friends. "What do you think happened?"

"I think he got handsy on her but what doesn't add up, is that her lip was busted and he was hit from behind. Right before that, Jakotsu said you called and Café Suave is only a few blocks from this hospital."

"And if you knew the truth? Then what?"

"I would get that asshole fired and keep Rin on staff. Byakuya is a lecher and everyone has that one patient they have to save. For Rin it's you."

 _That one patient they have to save?_ So I'm a charity case and here I thought there was something more to us. If I was more petty, I might just let her take the fall for what happened. But yet, a part of me wants to believe there is something more between us than just patient and therapist. "What did she say?"

Bankotsu chuckles. "She hasn't said much, that's part of the problem."

That doesn't sound like Rin at all. She's more the type to speak out which leaves me to wonder why she is remaining silent. She gains nothing by being quiet about this, but getting herself fired. "Alright," and then I tell him what I know. All of it. When he asks if I knew she had gone out with him, to get me to the top of the potential clients, I say I did and that we had discussed it ahead of time. But I had no idea there was a history between them. Some beasts are better left lying. She did not tell me ahead of time, which means that now I am saying that I have always been curious about the surgery, which is entirely untrue. Inuyasha has been trying to convince me for years to look into it. Hope is evil.

I have never been interested in it. I only spent four months thinking I would walk again and then gave up and accepted where I was. I have dad to thank for that. There were other surgeries that could have been tried, all costing tens of thousands of dollars that I no longer had access to. I had asked, even begged if he would pay for more, something, anything to even restore some sensation below my waist, but he refused. I was wasting my time and energy as usual and that could not be done. I should give up and accept that I would never walk again, move on, grow up. Personally, I grew bitter.

"Well, thank you, for you candidness," Bankotsu tells me and shakes my hand on the way out.

I was released on a Friday which left me the weekend thinking about what happened and whether or not Rin would be fired for something that wasn't her fault. True, I did not ask her to interfere, to give me hope or even to be a friend. But yet she did and maybe it is because we are cut from the same cloth that I have been able to connect with her, when so many before, I couldn't.

"Sesshomaru! You're going to get sicker!" mom calls from the patio doors.

I lost track of how long I had been in the garden. Winter can be brutal and zap the soil of nutrients and it's ability to sprout in the spring. My apple tree is holding up well. Her trunk has hardened to prevent frost from entering and protect against the cold. I forgot that I had been sitting under her boughs with my hands tucked into my pockets for warmth. "Go inside."

"You've been out here for two hours. Come back inside. You're supposed to be resting." She doesn't give me a choice. One of the downsides of having handles connected to my back is that someone can grab them and haul me back in the house like I'm a disobedient child again.

This time the joke is on her. I slam the break on. I don't want to be in the house.

"Sesshomaru," she releases it and starts trying to pull me back in the house.

"It reeks in there."

She stops and lets the handles go. "I'm supposed to check your temperature."

"I'm fine."

"If you were, you wouldn't be sitting out here in the cold—"

"Says the woman that can't take her lips off the bottle for more than a few seconds."

"Is that supposed to hurt?"

Of course it wouldn't hurt, if it did, she would stop drinking in the first place. But what's years of animosity and hatred towards dear old dad if we can't get shit-faced while we're at it? But she's right, I shouldn't be outside, so this time I let her take me inside and park me in my room, reminding me that my home is covered in the scent of cigarette smoke. "Why don't you smoke outside?"

"It's my house too."

"It's my house."

"Sesshomaru—"

"Mother," I turn on her. "Smoke. Out. Side."

"It never bothered you before," she whines. If I didn't need her to cover half the bills, I swear I wouldn't care if she stayed or left, but this is my lot in life. Suddenly I'm hacking my lungs up again, buckled over on myself. "You aren't okay." She hauls me over to the bed and helps lift me up, which is like dancing with a literal drunk, because she trips and then we both fall into the bed. The last woman I want in bed with me is my mother. I shove her off my chest and scoot back until I'm braced by the headboard and the coughing fit stops. I don't even know who is going to be coming in here next week to facilitate my exercises, but as I look around at my room that is neat, I know there are dishes stacked high in the kitchen that mother hasn't dealt with, laundry that needs clean and that all of this, I am going to have to do. In another hour she might be blacked out anyway.

"Open." She holds a thermometer to my lips.

"Stop."

"I have to check."

"I don't need it. Get out."

Pain flashes across her face, she leaves. Exactly what I wanted. "Why won't you let me help you? You did before."

"I needed it before. I don't now. I'm fine, get out."

That will be just enough to have her buried in the bottle. I close my eyes and take deep breaths, trying to relax, but my chest feels tight and breathing is a chore. It doesn't stop though. I start hacking my lungs up again, over and over until catching my breath is hard and an inhaler won't relieve it. They said this could happen. I've been through it before.

Mom comes in, bottle in hand but also with a nebulizer and suddenly I'm being lassoed and forced to breathe a salty-sweet vapor that slowly begins to loosen the tightness in my chest. "I'm calling your brother."

I shake my head, but my body is already sagging from exertion. The world goes black.

It's late afternoon when I wake up and of course my brother is sitting on my bed with Kieran parked in front of the Television watching Daniel Tiger. "What are you doing here?"

"Your mom called when you passed out. I've been here for a few hours. What were you doing outside?"

"My garden, what else? Where is your wife?"

"At home, studying for her final. It seems our baby sitter hasn't felt well lately."

That makes me laugh. She's lost hours of studying because of my illness. "And the prognosis?"

"You need to sleep more. Your lungs are clearer. So…I heard via the rumor tree you bashed Wister in the back."

"Did I?"

"He may have come in with massive bruise on his back to work today and had trouble lifting a scalpel and was told to take a few days off."

"How do you know that?"

"I just started a neuro-rotation. Now until the end of winter. I'm thinking of applying for their study on nerve transplant therapy," he pauses when he says this because we both know what he is thinking.

"You know I don't have the money to pay for it."

"I talked to Dr. Hazan about you. He knows your case relatively well—"

"I didn't ask you to do that!" I snap at him.

"I don't care. I did it anyway, especially after that stunt you two pulled. The trial group is already filled and after that, they're looking to make it available to patients next year." His cheeks shade and his eyes, so expressive and gold, like mine fall.

"No longer free and experimental right?"

"About fifty thousand dollars, but we could raise it."

"I'm not selling my medals." Those are the last things from my glory days I have to hold onto, the medals, trophies and ribbons.

"Ask dad?"

"So he can tell me what a waste my life has been again? No thank you."

He growls and leans back in his chair, shaking his head. "You really plan on living like this rest of your life don't you?"

"What else would I do?"

"Coach? Go to college? Do something besides plant things? You'd make a great manny."

"Not in the books for me."

"Then what is?"

Thank god my phone rings just that moment to get me out of this conversation. I have a habit of silencing calls I don't know the numbers to. Something else I got from gaining fame. You never know who is calling, but then I get a message and decide to listen to it. " _Hi this is Miroku Houshi, Rin's brother-in-law. I got your number from Rin. We'd like to invite you over to dinner tomorrow night at five. We eat early, as a thank you for helping Rin on Friday."_

_"_ _What are you doing?" a voice that sounds like Rin says in the background._

_"_ _Inviting him for dinner."_

_"_ _Uninvite him! I can't eat dinner with clients!"_

_"_ _Be quiet. Anyway, if you need help coming, we'd be happy to pick you up. Rin will be here and she is very excited to see you."_

_"_ _No I'm not! Give me the phone!—" and then the message ends._

"What are you smiling about?"

"I've been invited to dinner tomorrow at five." The phone starts ringing again from the same number. "Hello?"

_"_ _Hello, this is Miroku Houshi, I just left a message."_

Inuyasha slaps my arm and mouths, "put it on speaker."

"No," I mouth back to him.

" _Well, the phone cut off before I was able to leave our address. We live in Aurora, the Chamber Heights neighborhood?"_

"I know it."

_"_ _We have twin girls, so dinner comes early and is usually noisy and hectic, but we'd love if you join us."_

_"_ _I hate you, Miroku."_

"I'd love to come." I may not be able to ask her out, but that doesn't mean her family can't.

"I'll text our address, um…do you need help—"

"No. I have a ride," I interject quickly. I'm not that helpless and I'm looking at my ride. "I'll be there at five."

After I hang the phone up, Inuyasha is staring at me with the biggest grin on his face as if he's hit the jackpot. "You got a date with her?"

"Not a date."

"But dinner with her family. Is she going to be there?"

"Are you going to give your older brother a ride?"

"Of course. She's going to be there?"

I nod.

"Yes! Wait you're not supposed to go out!"

Inuyasha and I go back and forth over whether or not I should go out. My lungs still ache and the coughing fits make me want to buckle. It's decided that he will come over and assist me with recovering faster and that mother will be told to smoke outside.

Of course I catch her in her room, half passed out taking a drag, completely oblivious to the world. After easily resting it from her fingers and putting it out, she loses consciousness and I stare at the state of my home. My room is orderly, because it must be, but in my absence the clutter has grown. The dishes have not been washed, the counters need to be wiped down and as always, it's my brother who tells me to go back to bed and when I wake up hours later the house is clean.

It only adds to my guilt, knowing that he gave up time to study to care for me, again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment. I am enjoying the feedback I am getting from this story.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru goes to Miroku and Sango's house. And things become heated.

**Rin**

The first boy I brought home to meet my family was Shippo. It was a year after my mother died. I was thirteen and we had entered the same qualifying recital. It's a performance you do in front of a bunch of judges who rank you novice, junior or senior.

Kohaku came with me and skated for the first time in singles. He scored Novice and I scored Junior. That night, Shippo, Kohaku and I, all sat down and talked about what we wanted. Shippo had been going at it alone in singles but wanted to skate pairs. He's a lot like Kohaku and I. We're all orphans, only Shippo was a foster kid. He got shipped around a lot, but he always came back to the rink.

He started when he was ten, hanging around the glass and looking pathetic. After a while, Kaede noticed him and brought Shippo onto the ice. He came back over and over and slowly his story came out. His mom was a heroin addict and his dad, an alcoholic. He was in the system and it seemed his foster families never noticed when he was missing.

That night, Kohaku dropped out of skating and Shippo finally decided he wanted to do pairs. We went back in and started goofing off on the ice together and discovered that we weren't a bad team. The only problem was that neither one of us could re-qualify for the season and he was already ranked Junior too.

Sango and Miroku let us stay out late that night until ten. We went to a movie and then an ice-cream shop to celebrate. Eventually Shippo and I started holding hands and before the night was over he gave my first real kiss and I was over the moon. His lips were soft. Our tongues slid against each other so sloppily, it was more like licking a puppy than an actual kiss.

The next night, I brought him over for dinner, because the family he was staying with wasn't exactly the best at providing for him. Kohaku hooked him up with some hand me downs and he became part of the family. He spent the night a few nights in a row and eventually we fostered and adopted him.

We dated for a year, but then he came out and to be honest, we knew all along. He just needed a safe place to live so he could accept who he was.

It's why I'm cringing after Miroku calls Sesshomaru. I'm already in trouble at work for overstepping the boundaries. That split lip Bya gave me required a few stitches and like everything in my house, it's all one big family affair. Kohaku called Sango, Sango called Miroku, Miroku called Shippo and before I knew it, I was in the emergency department with everyone and Jakotsu, who was on the phone with his brother fessing up to everything, because it was _for my own good_.

Thank god, I was able to salvage my job with a promise that I would not get too involved again and also that they felt it was best that Sesshomaru work with Suikotsu again. But then I got a text that night from Bya, more like a threat that if I said anything, he would make me pay. And he has the power to be able to. It's why I said nothing to the social worker who showed up because the bruise on my cheek looked like a hand print and nothing to the police officer who asked if I wanted to make a report.

When I got home, the whole family followed. Miroku yelled at me, "Rin what were you thinking!?"

"I obviously wasn't thinking," I replied blandly. What else was I supposed to say? I curled up on the couch and Kohaku and Shippo went into the kitchen to make me some soup.

Miroku sat down next to me. I curled against him like I was eleven again and started sobbing. I didn't mean to make such a mess of things. I just wanted to help Sesshomaru and that was the worst part. He has so much potential and being in that chair is killing him. "I've never seen you so worried about a patient before."

"I've never had a patient like him before," I whimpered into his neck.

I opened my phone and flipped through a few videos until I found a montage of Sesshomaru competing. Sango's mouth fell open and Miroku's eyes widened. I knew they saw what I do. He was powerful, prideful, a veritable ass but that was his life and I get it. At the end was the fall. He goes up and then it's almost like he loses consciousness on the fall and goes down hard, and that's it. His body is carried away. He's limp.

"I made a mistake. I'm such an idiot."

"Not an idiot." Sango sat down next to me. "I think you care about him."

"I care about all my patients."

"No, I think you care about him," she repeats herself. "I think he means something more to you. You said he asked you out?"

"I had to say no. I can't date my patients. It's against the rules."

"But if he weren't your patient, you would have said yes?" Miroku smiled at me, rubbing my back.

"Yeah. I would have. He's an ass, not like Bya. He's just angry sometimes, but when he lets his defenses down, he's gentle and sweet. He's fun to talk to and—"

"He doesn't see the athlete?" Sango added in, with a starry look at Miroku. She's been there, she knows what it's like.

"Yeah. He sees me."

"Well then, we'll invite him to dinner, to say thank you for hitting that asshole in the back and getting him off you," Miroku said happily.

"That's a brilliant idea!" Sango shouted.

"No it's not!" I protested.

"What are we doing?" Shippo came out with soup and Kohaku held a thermos of tea. They set them in front of me. I was starving. I was at the ED for hours and my lip was still killing me.

"We're going to invite Sesshomaru over for family dinner Monday night, to thank him for helping Rin," Sango supplied.

"No we aren't!"

"No. It's settled. This way, we get to meet him before it gets serious and make sure he is worthy of our Rin," Miroku said proudly.

After they left, I couldn't sleep. So I did what I have since I lost my mom. I got up and went into Kohaku's room. Thank god for once, he didn't have a random woman in the bed with him, so there was space for me to crawl in next to him and hug his back. He woke up and patted my hand. "I feel so stupid."

"Just accept that you like him and I think you'll feel less stupid."

"I can't sleep."

Kohaku has a voice like a dove. It's an alto that floats through your ears like the wind. He started singing a lullaby his mother used to sing to him and the next thing I knew, I woke up in my bed on Saturday morning.

Monday comes and first thing, I am sat down with Bankotsu and all the brothers and reminded of the reputation of their center. I'm told I'm new, and because Jakotsu vouched for me, I would get a second chance. Suikotsu protests taking me off Sesshomaru's case. Mainly because that means that he will have to deal with Sesshomaru and I had been making some good headway. Really, Suikotsu doesn't want to have to deal with Sesshomaru again, at all.

I don't fight it and once again, Bankotsu asks me to make a statement. I refuse. Then he tells me that he had a signed statement from Sesshomaru about what had happened. As well as what Jakotsu had seen. He asks me why I'm not saying anything? I can't say anything. That text from Bya is still burning a hole in my pocket.

I go about my day like normal, but I am definitely dragging, which catches Jakotsu's attention. He drags me into the break room and stands by the door to block it, stamping his foot. "What the hell is going on with you?"

"Nothing."

"You've been dragging worse than a plow today." His eyes darken and narrowed in on me. "That bastard threatened you didn't he?"

"No—"

"Don't you lie to me! Rin we have been best friends for five years now, I know when you are lying. Your lips quiver and you tuck your hair behind your ear."

My hand freezes just by my ear.

"Damn mother fucker. You going to let him get away with this?"

"It's not that simple."

"It's always that simple! So what if his daddy is on the medical board. So is Suikotsu!"

"What?"

"Yeah Sui is on the medical board. You come forward and say what happened, we'll get that boy's ass thrown out of the program."

"I don't believe it."

"I told you he was bad news back when you dated him. You didn't have to do this. You could have kept puddles as your patient so you could massage his fine bony ass."

I snort back some tears, because I am going to miss having Sesshomaru as my patient. I've gotten used to the jibes and the disgruntled behavior. "Miroku and Sango invited him over for dinner."

"What?"

"He was there. You saw it. They want to thank him."

"You going?"

"No. So I can get into more trouble here?"

"I won't tell anyone."

"You think I should go tonight?"

"I think you should. Look you two obviously like each other and he was spitting bricks this morning when Serena showed up on his door. Made her leave crying in about ten minutes with a promise that if you don't show up tomorrow he'll leave the center."

I start laughing so hard I'm spitting my tears off my lips. "What am I going to do?"

"What do you want to do? That's what you need to think about. Ban knows Sesshomaru's got a sweet spot for you. You only messed up because you tried to flirt your way into a study. He would have overlooked you dating a patient and made the good Lord work with someone else. Not like it hasn't happened before. It is an ethical violation, but Sesshomaru Takahashi can always be cared for by another therapist."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying, encourage him to see and work with another physical therapist so you can see him outside of work."

"I don't know if I'm ready for another relationship."

"Well, I can tell you one thing, he's ready for a friend and you're about the best friend I have ever had." We hug and I finally stop crying. I take the phone out and show him the text. "You have to tell Ban. You made a novice mistake, but he assaulted you baby. Show this to Ban and tell him the truth about what happened and about when you were dating."

I nod, sucking in air just when Mukotsu opens the door and tells me there is a phone call for me. I shouldn't be surprised to hear that it was Sesshomaru, but my heart leaps lightly. "Hi," for once he doesn't speak so confidently.

"Hey. So, how are you feeling?"

"Better. Still run down a bit."

"Sorry to hear that." The conversation is so awkward.

"About tonight, I wanted to make sure you're comfortable with it."

"It's fine."

"So you are going?"

"Yeah. Family tradition. Dinner once a week."

"Why aren't you reporting him?"

"I'm going to," I answer quickly. "I was actually about to go into the office and talk to Ban. He, Byakuya sent me a message, threatening me."

"Bastard."

"Yep. It's kind of a long story but look I better go—"

"Wait."

"What?"

"Nothing, I'll see you tonight."

By the time I hang the phone up, my chest is fluttering. I do like him, but at twenty five and after what I went through with Byakuya, liking isn't enough.

Bankotsu is already standing next to me with a serious look on his face. He motions me to follow him and that pit forming in my stomach comes back. Before he can even start speaking, I pass him my phone with the message from Byakuya on it. His eyebrows knit together in concern as he sits down at his desk. "This isn't the first time this has happened is it?"

"No. We broke up about three months ago. We dated for half a year and it started out great but then he became controlling and I went along with it. Mostly because not many people see me for me. Anyway, he hit me and I broke up with him. I know what I did was wrong, and unprofessional and I probably did get too close to this, to Sesshoumaru."

"It's hard to separate yourself from someone who is so much like you. I know that. I haven't seen him connect to anyone before."

"Yeah…"

"You know Suikotsu is also on the medical board. One of my college buddies is as well. We can protect you if you want to pursue this."

"I know. I don't know if I want to, I just wanted you to know the truth."

"About Sesshomaru," Bankotsu stops me from getting up. "He made Serena leave his house crying this morning. We usually send the newer ones to make the house calls, but anyone we send is going to end up at the wrong end of his sardonic personality—"

"He really isn't that bad."

"To you. To everyone else," Bankotsu shrugs. "I'd like you to continue to work with him, but the moment something more develops between the two of you, I need to know."

"Nothing is going to. He's not my type and I'm not ready to get into another relationship."

Bankotsu chuckles. "Smell the roses Matthew, everyone else sees it when you two interact together. If he wants nerve transplant therapy, I can facilitate getting him to the right doctors. The study Byakuya is on was closed. He knew that when you approached him, which makes him more at fault. What I'm more concerned about is that you knowingly put yourself in harm's way."

"It was dumb I know."

"No, in a way it showed that you cared about your patient and you are willing to go to great lengths to see they get the care they need."

"Look I'm not trying to make him walk again, to change him or feed him false hopes. When I was dating Bya, there were a few cases with similar injuries to Sesshomaru's that had sensation and movement restored in the lower limbs. I know it's a long shot, but he's not adapting. He doesn't know how. His pride was everything and if there was just something he could find to give him hope—"

"He needs to be in better shape for that to work."

"I know. If it was going to work, he needs to have more physical independence and his muscles need to be more toned."

"Easily another six months to a year of conditioning to make up for what he hasn't done in the last four."

"Yeah," I say, staring at my lap.

"I'll give you the address to his home. He asked for morning appointments. Keep the exercise light, his lungs are still recovering."

I smile and get up, then stop. "Bankotsu can I ask you something?"

"Depends on what it is."

"Why do you keep talking him out of coming here. Medicaid doesn't pay well and he obviously hates it here."

"There are only two physical therapy centers in Denver that treat ex-athletes with the kind of professionalism that protects their privacy. One is us and the other is Wind. If he leaves here, he's likely to go to Wind and there's an issue there. Kagura doesn't want him there."

"Why not?"

"You don't know?"

"Know what?"

"They used to be a pair, back before his injury."

"That makes no sense. She's so attentive and kind and she believes in the heart of the patient. What happened?"

"You'd have to ask her. Either way, she's begged me to keep him from going to Wind and made several large fiscal contributions to our center."

"And you say my ethics are questionable."

"They're donations, not bribes." He smirks at me.

Say what you want, I call it bribery and how can someone who believes so firmly in what Kagura does, not be with him? That's what I am thinking about as I walk down the street to Sango and Miroku's. I'm running late because I didn't get off early like I wanted. It's fucking cold out and my hands are shaking. I'm jogging down the street when I hear a car horn and jolt so hard that I end up slipping on some ice again, and catch myself on a street sign. "Son of a bitch."

"Do you always go skating?" Oh, I know that voice.

Inuyasha's car is idling. Sitting next to him in the passenger seat with the window down is Sesshomaru. I glance down the street. I'm only four blocks from my sister's house but I'm freezing my ass off. "No." I can't look at him the same. For many people, they need something or someone to live for. It all makes sense now. No one has been there for him, except his brother. When he lost it all, he really lost it all. Kagura left him, or did he push her away?

"Do you want a ride?" Sesshomaru asks me more softly.

"Um…"

"It's ten degrees out. Come on," Inuyasha waves me in. In the back is an adorable little boy with silver hair like his father.

"Why not." I get in the car. I'm met with warm air that makes me feel like I'm thawing out. "Hey little guy." I smile at the boy in the backseat.

He only smiles back and claps his hands.

"Watch out. He has sticky hands," Sesshomaru chides from the front seat.

"It's your fault. I told you not to give him that pastry," Inuyasha says.

"What kind of Uncle would I be if I didn't?"

"Show off." Inuyasha shakes his head and the car starts moving. "He thinks because the berries came from his garden, he can give my son whatever he wants."

"It's winter," I say curiously.

"I freeze the berries during the summer and fall when they're ripe enough." Sesshomaru shifts in his chair to tell me.

"So you make pastries?" I ask.

"Sometimes. Someone has to cook."

We stop in front of Sango and Miroku's house. I get out first, followed by Inuyasha. He takes Sesshomaru's wheels out of the car and puts the chair together. It makes me wonder how much he has relied on others to do things for him. I can't help it, the physical therapist in me watches as he gets out of the car, transferring from the seat into the chair. I'm proud of him. His triceps have gotten stronger since working with me and he almost flawlessly pushes himself from one to the other. "Not bad."

"Only because she has been making you work," Inuyasha says. "Call me when you need a ride home."

He leaves quickly. Sesshomaru and I approach the house alone. Sesshomaru rolls slowly and every so often he breaks into a coughing fit. "You don't sound so good."

"Left over cough. It will go away in time. Your face looks better," he sounds just as awkward as I feel.

"Make up. I had to get stitches on my lip," my voices catches slightly in my throat.

He grabs my hand and stops me from walking. "Are you really alright?" We stop at the step to my family's house.

"Shit." I wince looking at the step. "You okay if I give you a lift?" I open the door so I can help him get through. It occurs to me quickly that the house is not at all set up for someone in a wheel chair. I can already hear Keaton and Kelsey screaming their heads off inside and likely the floor is covered in toys and the chair might be a tight squeeze between the closet and the couch. Great…

He looks down at the step. I swear he must be willing himself to walk, because his eyes are fixed on the semi-fancy black shoes he's wearing. I lean against the door, figuring out how to tackle this, because there are only going to be more obstacles inside the house. Two of them moving targets. "You know it's okay to need help."

His eyes dart up to mine and harden. They redden around the edges but I know better than to back down. "It's what friends do for each other and it's not the end of the world either."

"That's what they all say—"

"Because it's true. I'm sure you've heard everything but," I get down on my knees so I can see his eyes and not make him crane his neck. "I want you here and I want to have a good time too. So, that means getting over this step and inside. My nieces are disasters. Sweet and snuggly, but they crawl all over the place. Come on, let me give you a boost without it killing your pride. I'm glad you came." I mean that last part, even if it makes me nervous as hell because of work, because of lines I might cross.

"Fine," he lets out quietly. His pride has already taken a hit. After opening the door, I give him a boost and push him over the lip of the door and then let him take over. I'm not sure what's heavier, the chair or the one sitting in it.

At the entrance, he's forced to dodge the toys on the floor. "Hey guys!" I call into the room. The girls are crawling around the floor. Keaton is on top of Kelsey, tugging on her black hair and knocking her over. "Keaton! You're such a bully!" I move around Sesshomaru's chair and pick up the bigger twin. She's already made her sister cry harder.

Sango comes running with a horrified look on her face and an apron that used to be white. "I can't get anything done with these two! I'm never going to finish dinner. The meat isn't even on the grill!"

"Where's Kohaku and Shippo? Oh this is Sesshomaru," I point him out. He's been quiet and his eyes are on me. "Sesshomaru, this is my big sister Sango."

"Pleasure to meet you." He holds out his hand.

"I'm so happy to meet you! And so grateful! Thank you again, for kicking that guy's ass." Sango grabs Keaton and starts rocking her on her hip. "Can you take them?" She throws Keaton at me and suddenly my arms are full of babies, while she runs back into the kitchen.

Sesshomaru chuckles and wheels himself around the toys, leaning down and throwing them onto the couch before he swivels his way into the thick of everything. "I suppose I should offer to help," he holds his hands out for one of the babies.

"What do you know about babies?"

"Kieran. Kagome had an emergency C-section. He was wrapped in his cord and suddenly started sating really low. Her parents and brother were there and I was in the hallway. You can give me one of them now." He motions with his hands again.

"Take Keaton. She's the squirmy one." I hand him my darker haired niece, with blue eyes and he starts smiling at her and tickling her tummy. Keaton coos back at him, like she knows she can charm him.

"Inuyasha had finals around the time he was born. I came over frequently to help with the baby. She's also in school. It gave me something to do."

"That's cute. This one is tired." I start bouncing Kelsey in my arms, just as Miroku comes from the back of the house. "Miroku did she eat dinner yet?"

"Not yet!" He rushes past us and then stops, takes a few steps back and greets Sesshomaru. "Nice to meet you. Thank you for helping my sister."

"My pleasure," Sesshomaru responds confidently. Miroku disappears. The front door opens, Shippo and Kohaku run in, shaking out their shivers. They throw their hats and gloves into the closet.

"Hey, it's the pipe wielding hero!" Shippo laughs as he walks by. "I bet you have some killer upper body strength."

Sesshomaru doesn't answer, making nervous that this was just one big mistake. At any moment someone is going to say something stupid about him being in a wheel chair.

"Remind me to bring you next time there's a bar fight at the club I play at." Kohaku grins wildly at him.

"What do you play?" Sesshomaru asks, rocking the chair back and forth with one hand, while balancing Keaton with the other.

"Guitar, Saxophone, Base, drums, pretty much anything but the piano." Kohaku goes to sit, but Sango yells at him to come help in the kitchen and then throws a pile of plates at Shippo. "Well, I guess we'll talk later. I play at the Stonewall on Friday and Saturday nights, if you're ever out."

"I'll keep it in mind," Sesshomaru replies. Keaton starts yawning on his lap. "It's too early for sleep." He tickles her chin.

"I think they're hungry," I tell him and get up, heading for the kitchen. Kelsey squirms in my arms, whining and crying, rubbing her eyes.

The kitchen is like a blizzard of activity. Miroku has a large bowl of meat and is heading for the back patio. He will grill, even if it's negative outside. Shippo is setting the table, Kohaku has been wrangled into cutting vegetables and Sango is simmering the soup and cooking potato wedges. "Can I feed the twins?" I ask as I open the fridge looking for something to fill them up with. I grab two yogurts, two spoons, two bibs and nearly smack into Sango's stomach when I get up.

"Rin!" Sango yells.

"Sorry! Can I help?"

"Just keep the twins busy, please?" Sango begs me and wedges her way into the kitchen. "They did nothing but scream today. I'm so far behind. I was supposed to balance the books for Miroku and I didn't get to it, then Keaton threw up because she ate too much and Kelsey hasn't napped all day!"

"I got it. We'll take care of them," I try to reassure her, but I'm kicked out of the kitchen with a bag of veggie straws for both girls and the yogurts. I find Sesshomaru with Keaton in the living room. My ears strain when I hear a soft tenor coming from his lips. He's singing to my niece and it's the most adorable thing in the world. She's curled against his shoulder, eyes drooping.

I join him with the other baby and we make use of the nearing bumbos to get them fed. I put them on the floor and then glance up at him. He can't get on the floor with me and I wonder what it would take to get him out of that chair here and on the floor playing.

"Lively family," he tells me around six, when the dinner is finally done. Kohaku and Shippo have joined us in the living room.

"We try. It's always been like this," Shippo says. Now the boys have the twins and I can head into the dining room. I see an instant problem. I start rearranging the chairs so it will be easier for Sesshomaru to slide his wheels in at the head of the table. "Think Miroku will care if I move him? It's probably easier for him to move here."

"It's fine," Sesshomaru says from behind me.

"No, it's fine, we can move the chairs around," Sango says and makes space for him at the table.

I pass a look at Sesshomaru because I know this must be so out of his comfort zone but then I see Keaton passed out on his lap. "I think you have a gift!" Sango squeals loudly, and then covers her mouth. "How did you get her to sleep?"

He shrugs and doesn't answer, while he passes the baby to Sango. He works his magic on Kelsey next, rocking her and wheeling her around in his chair. Once she's down, dinner is finally ready.

We all talk and gab about our week. Shippo started dating this new guy named, Kanta. Kanta is a short, thin guy. They've been friends since high school and the kiss came out of nowhere for both of them but it has the rest of us laughing. Miroku purposely sat me next to Sesshomaru, making it so occasionally I fill him in on some of our family norms.

Halfway through the meal, he whispers in my ear, "Shippo looks nothing like the rest of your family." Shippo has bright red hair and pale skin, not like the rest of us that are sun darkened.

"He's adopted," I say proudly out loud. "We have kind of an unconventional family."

"I was a sad pathetic orphan, always at the rink and Kaede, our figure skating coach let me have free lessons. I ran away from every home I was at and then I started hanging out with Rin and Kohaku," Shippo keeps going, "basically, when Kohaku and Sango's mom got sick, Sango and Kohaku moved in with Rin's mom. She adopted them after Rina died and then she got sick and Sango and Miroku adopted Kohaku and Rin after Henna died. A few years later, they adopted me."

"We already had two teenagers, we figured why not a third?" Sango laughs, finally relaxed as the meal begins to wind down.

"So they're your cousins?" Sesshomaru asks me.

"Yep, Kohaku and Sango are my cousins, but we've all lived together long enough it's more like siblings. Our moms were really close. Shippo was the frosting on the already weird cake." I elbow Shippo.

"And her first kiss!" Shippo boasts.

"Shipp!" I smack his shoulder.

"You kissed your brother?" Sesshomaru's face breaks into a smile.

"He wasn't my brother then!" I protest.

"The kiss that started it all. That wasn't all we did first—"

"Shippo I'm going to kill you!" I swear my ears are turning red. I want to hide under the table so no one sees me. Sesshomaru's jaw tightens lightly. I hide my face in my hands.

"I knew you were strange," Sesshomaru teases, "but not that strange."

"Oh my god!" I throw my napkin down on the table and get up. I've barely touched my plate, my stomach is growling, but I'm not allowed to anything solid for a few days. My lip stings too.

"Rin!" Shippo calls after me.

I'm not mad. I'm not even upset, I just need some air. Shippo and I fooled around off and on. We were making out once when I was fifteen and he was sixteen, vacillating back and forth between whether or not he actually was gay or was just going through a phase. I don't even know why he had to qualify it with a phase. I'm guessing it has to do with what his previous foster-families felt.

Anyway, we were staying up late one night watching a few movies, long after Miroku and Sango went to bed. Kohaku was supposed to be playing video games in his room, while we were in the basement and things got hot and heavy. I still remember the way his fingers tickled up my bare back and how he silently asked permission to touch my breast.

I didn't know fingers could brand your nipple, or feel so hot and then he lifted my shirt and sucked, and I swear my vagina went into convulsions. I moved closer, letting him slide on top of me and then I felt how hard he was. I was just as curious as he was. His skin was hot like fire. I pumped him a few times. His fingers went down between my legs and although I felt hot and wet down there, we didn't get far. It was like a sloppy seal, flopping in and out of me. I moaned at his mouth lapping circles around my nipples. His fingers were firm and foreign, unskilled and slightly painful.

"Are you alright?"

"Jesus, fuck!" I jump and nearly fall down the stairs to the basement. It's a good thing Sesshomaru has good upper body strength. He catches me by the elbow with a raised eyebrow. "Don't you know not to sneak up on people when they are lost in thought?"

"I thought I was saving you from embarrassment."

"Not embarrassed. Just needed a break."

"So you had sex with your brother?"

"God no!" I kick his leg playfully at first, until I remember he can't feel it and I just kicked the disabled. "Shit, I'm sorry."

"Was that supposed to hurt?" He slaps my side.

We both start laughing and then the hallway is filled with an awkward silence. "I would go outside for fresh air, but I'd freeze my ass off. I love the family dinners but sometimes, even I need air."

"You're lucky," he tells me, moving a bit closer and then spinning so his back is against the wall. "The last time I sat down with my family was Christmas three years ago, before I had my garden built."

"Garden?" So he does have something that interests him.

He takes his phone out and brings up the pictures. He shows me the apple tree when it's heavy with fruit, the melons he planted last year, the rose bush and the herb beds. He describes them in great detail and then I see a picture of him sitting in front of several tomato bushes. It doesn't escape me that the beds have been raised and the walkways are wide to accommodate his disability or that he is smiling.

"It's beautiful. You'd make a great landscaper."

"If I could go to school. Tell me how does one pass the classes if they can't walk?"

I shake my head at him and try to avoid rolling my eyes. He's so stubborn. "You're good at it."

"I suppose you'll tell me to make a living so I don't mooch of the government?"

"Do you always use sarcasm as a way to hide what you really feel? I said it was pretty. Sango would probably pay you to help her with the backyard. She tries to plant a garden every spring and kills everything."

He doesn't say anything. I look around for somewhere to sit but there isn't, so I just slide down the wall and rest my head against my knees. I yawn so wide, it nearly feels like my skin is going to peel. "Ouch." My hand comes up to my lip.

"Still hurts?"

"Yeah. Thank you. I didn't have a chance to say it then, but I'm really glad you came." I flick my tongue against the wound. "Am I bleeding?"

He pushes himself more upright and lifts my chin, touching my lip tenderly. I flick my tongue again to add moisture, inadvertently hitting the tip of his finger, making us both suck in air. "Sorry," I whisper.

"It's fine. The lick and the lip. Why did you date him anyway? You don't seem the type to let someone treat you like that."

"What type am I?"

"Strong willed, smart, agile, focused. You couldn't get on the Olympic track if you weren't."

"It's because of that I did. You know how it goes right? Guy meets girl. Guy finds out girl is former athlete. Guy takes selfie, tells all his friends and suddenly you have a reputation for being easy and even now, sometimes the tabloids catch wind of some facebook post of an ex-boyfriend who said they slept with me. Byakuya wasn't like that. He was sweet at first. Treated me like a queen."

"A smooth talker?"

"Yeah. When he found out who I was, he didn't react. I literally had to move my trophies and medals here. Even Kohaku's girlfriends take pictures of them to try to sell online."

"Hot commodity," Sesshomaru scoffs. "What happened?"

"Bya changed. A few months in, he would do the typical abusive male thing. Who did you talk to? Why are you texting this person? I don't like you hanging out with your brothers' friends. He hated Shippo. It's pretty much the family joke that I played around with Shippo. Then one night, we got into a fight," I swallow hard and cover my eyes, "I shouldn't be telling you this."

"Patient-Therapist privilege. I won't tell anyone." He wants to connect, I know that. I didn't even tell my family the truth of what happened that night, just that he hit me. "There's no obligation to either."

I take a deep breath and exhale, "we were in bed, you know…we hadn't gone all the way yet and I didn't want to. It just didn't feel right. He held me down and slapped me across the face. I kneed him in the crotch and sent him flying. We broke up after that. I lied and said I was seeing someone else. I was sleeping with this mythical other person, just to get away."

I didn't notice that while I was talking he began stroking my cheek with the back of his fingers. His fingers are warm, worn and comforting. Instinctively, I lean into his touch, as if it's something familiar I've felt before. "Why won't you report him?" he asks me more seriously.

"Fear," the answer shocks even me. "Why are you so easy to talk to?" I fold my legs over each other and hold his hand. Like this, my chin reaches up to the arm rest on his chair as I yawn again, I lean against it.

"Maybe because you're easy to talk to. You look exhausted."

"You too. Where do you keep your shrine?"

"On the mantel, at least some of it, the rest in the closet in my room."

"Want to see mine?"

"Sure."

I get up lazily, so exhausted and head to the stairs, glancing at him and the stairs and then facepalming. "Shit, I forgot. They're downstairs and—"

"I can't walk?"

"Can you do the stairs?"

"I can't walk."

"Yeah but that doesn't mean with those awesome triceps you've been building you can't butt-bump down the stairs."

"Butt-bump?" I think he might want to kill me. He's giving me that look like he does in therapy when he's unhappy and doesn't want to do something. "Not happening."

He thinks he can get away, but those handles on the back of his chair are mine. "Nope. We're doing this."

"I am not."

"Yes we are. I'll show you and make sure you don't fall. Kohaku can carry the chair down—"

"No!" Yep, he's pissed. His eyes have pinched around the edges and the gold is that much more visible.

"You do know if you spend your entire life hiding and refusing to try new things, you're just going to get depressed…more depressed." He looks so cute right now. His forehead is wrinkled and I can't help but think of how much fun this is going to be.

"I'm recovering from pneumonia."

"Nice excuse Takahashi. Come on. Can you get on the floor without much trouble?"

His gaze moves away from me. I know I've hit on something else we probably need to work on in therapy.

"What happens if you fall at home?"

"I don't."

"Be honest, please? It's my job to help you—"

"Is that all I am? A job?"

A part of me wants to growl, another part yell, but I settle for grumbling, while I get in front of him and put my hands on his knees. Part of me wonders, even if he can't feel the sensation, does he feel my fingers trembling? "No. Look, I'm in a rough spot with this. You're my patient and my family invited you." His eyes darken. "I said I would date you if you weren't. I'd hope after tonight we could at least be friends. You're so easy to be around."

"Easy to be around?" He finally looks at me, and trust me, we're having another one of those moments that I just want to know what his lips taste like. It's like ever since we met, I can talk to him. Sesshomaru gets me and I get him and this chair he is in, well it doesn't mean anything to me.

"Trust me, I'm tight with my family. Jakotsu is my best friend, but I can't talk to many people how we're talking now. Come on. I'll help you. We'll play some video games or watch a movie."

"And how will I get back up?"

"Butt-bump. Besides, come downstairs and watch a movie with me, there's an eighty percent chance I'll fall asleep on you."

"Mmh, beautiful woman in my arms and all I have to do is butt-bump down the stairs?" He sizes them up, probably counts them too. I know I would.

"Come on. Make a fist with your left arm and lean over the side of the chair. I'll support your core on the way down." I glance around the hallway to make sure we don't have an audience. Sesshomaru takes a deep breath and follows my instructions. "Take your feet off first, and you'll want to move in a way that bends your knees to the side." I tug on his left leg, so it will fall to the side naturally and then wrap my arms around his core. Like this, I can feel his breath on my neck and his lips are so close. "I won't let you fall."

He stares at me and licks his lips. I know we're both thinking the same thing. "Use your other hand to push yourself down. Try to go slow. Ready?"

"Ready," he mutters.

"One, two, three." It's surprising that I don't have to take more of his weight. He pushes hard with his other hand, out of the chair and onto the ground with an impressive grace, until he plops sideways and I have to catch him around the waist.

"Everything alright?" Miroku comes around the corner.

"Yep, we're good. Just going to the basement." I point down, still holding onto Sesshomaru. "Good?"

He nods and takes his full weight.

"Should we—" Miroku starts but I stop him.

"I got it. We're good. I'm going to show him my shrine."

"It really doesn't bother you?" Sesshomaru asks me, and I don't even need to ask him to clarify.

"No." My mind flashes back to Kagura. How could she let him go? "Should you not walking bother me?"

"You would be the first not to look at me with pity."

"Pity doesn't help. I've seen it tear so many people down and make them feel like they can't. I'm sure I don't know how hard it's been for you, but I'm here now."

"As a therapist."

"And a friend. Come on. Scoot over to the stairs and I'll help you get down. It's mostly triceps work, which you have, because you've been doing the parallel bars."

He scoots like a pro to the lip of the stairs. I instruct him how to slide down one stair at a time, stop, move his legs, then do it again. His lips swivel around as if he's thinking whether or not he can manage this. "You don't have to be self-conscious if that is what you are thinking."

"No, just how to make sure I don't fall." Then he looks up at me and his eyes that are usually cold and distant fill with vulnerability, making me melt.

"I can do the legs if you want to take care of the top. One step at a time. We'll do it together." And that is exactly what we do. He slides down the first step, I move his legs and then the next and the next. By the time we are halfway down, we have a rhythm.

Until I miscalculate that my nieces put toys two steps from the bottom and the next thing I know, I'm flying backwards, landing on my back and he slips down the last two steps and lands on top of me. His chest presses into mine, making us both laugh.

I look into his eyes, catching his gaze again. He returns the look. It's like we're frozen in time. His ribs rise and fall against mine. He dips his neck down, angling his lips towards mine. I'm about to tell him, I can't do this, he's my patient, when his mouth brushes against mine. Our lips meet, hot, rough at first, in a sweet kiss that makes butterflies form in my stomach. His hair is soft and silky as I thread my fingers into it. I deepen the kiss, because why not? He's a great kisser and he's attractive and already on top of me.

He pulls back and tells me, "if I didn't, I would have gone crazy wondering what that felt like. Friends." He caresses my cheek bone with his thumb.

"Friends," although I repeat the word, I don't want to be just friends, but I'm also not ready to be in a relationship either.

He rolls sideways off me and scoots himself against the far wall. There's a wooden cabinet that is hung on the wall next to the staircase. Inside is our family shrine. Literally, it's all of the medals we've all won. Sango's, Kohaku's and mine. Shippo keeps his at his apartment. I open it for him, singing a triumphant song. "No Olympic gold. I biffed it on my first turn there. But you went three times. What was it like?"

"Amazing. There's nothing like competing against the best around the world. Especially when you know they are the ones that push you to do better than you have before."

We spend a while talking about competitions. I sit on the floor next to him. Slowly the space closes between us. He tells me about his first few competitions and how he placed low because he had issues following directions. I tell him how I fell the first time I tried to do a double jump and was terrified for weeks to try again. He had his own experience with that on the pommel horse and before we know it, we find we had more in common than before.

I find myself leaning against his shoulder and yawning when his phone goes off. "My brother. Times up. Who will I make cry in the morning?"

"Me," I whisper against him, half asleep. "Ban said I could take you back. You better behave, because I had this hot guy in my house until late and I'm exhausted."

"Hot guy?" I can feel him laughing, let alone hear it. "You're falling asleep."

"Mhh-hmm, against the hot guy."

"You really don't see it?"

"Don't see what?"

"My legs," he mutters, rubbing them, willing them to feel.

"Nope. I see you, Sesshomaru." My lids flutter, trying to stay awake. "Sorry," I yawn again and sit up, trying to pretend like I'm not falling asleep on him.

"You can lean. I don't mind."

"So when do I get to know more about you? Besides your medical history and the sick pleasure you get out of tormenting your physical therapists?" My body presses into his again.

"There isn't much to tell."

"I don't believe that."

"Gymnastics was my life. I wasn't very good at anything else and please don't tell me there is so much I can do."

I snort, because it's true. He's just not ready to admit it and I'm too tired to argue with him. "I won't try to convince you tonight. But when the weather warms up, I'm going to kick your ass at basketball."

"Because you know how to play in a wheel chair?"

"Yes I do. I have one in the basement."

"Why?"

"Can't connect with people if you don't try to sit in their shoes for a day. I did a few rotations in a rehab facility. I wanted to be able to model the motions the body goes through in a wheel chair. And I want to understand my patients. It's why I know the calluses on your hands hurt at the end of the day. That your back hurts and swells still, just above your injury sight and most days your arms burn by the time you go to bed."

"And everyone stares at you like it's catching," he adds in, his voice dripping with disdain.

"That too. I'm sorry I can't fix you."

He shrugs his shoulders.

"If it helps, I like you the way you are. Sardonic humor and all. Without you, I wouldn't have started skating again. Can I ask you something personal?"

"Depends."

"Fair response. If you could have it back, all of it would you go for it?"

"Competing? My legs," he gazes down at me. "That's not what you are asking."

"If I can land triples again, I can compete. I was going to try to throw a few in the next couple weeks, but then I would have to start training again, ballet, five hours at the rink and I don't know…"

"What do you want?"

"I don't know. I'm happy at Band of Seven but part of me, if I could—"

"You would. What's stopping you?"

"Diet, exercise, the torment of sore muscles," I giggle against his shoulder.

"The athlete diet. I think it's why I'm partial to pizza."

"You like Pizza?"

"I liked Pizza." His face changes enough for me to know it's now a food that doesn't agree with him. Dairy can become problematic for bowl movements in paraplegia.

"What about girlfriends?" I hedge. A part of me has to know why she left him. I've seen him at his worst and I've been with someone abusive before. It doesn't make sense to me how someone who specializes in physical therapy would see it as an impediment to a relationship.

"I've been single for a while. Most women see the floppy legs as an obstruction to a normal relationship."

"What's normal anyway." I squeeze his palm and kiss his shoulder. "I'm not ready to be in another relationship right now. It's not just that you are my patient. Bya messed me up."

He groans and shakes his head. For once I'm grateful he can't get up, because I get the feeling if he could, he would and I wouldn't be able to say what I need to. "If I didn't have makeup on right now, you'd see a nasty bruise on my cheek." Turning my head, I give him a view of what Bya did to me. "I could use another friend though."

"Friend," he repeats the word.

"Please? It's not an insult, it's what I need. I'm not even asking you to wait for me. If someone else comes along in your life, I'm not going to stop you—"

He cuts me off by kissing my lips. His tongue flicking across my lips makes me jolt. It's as if he is trying to heal my split lip. "Ow," I whisper against his mouth, melting into his arms. "Sesshomaru, please?" If he only knew how terrified I am of having another relationship. In my family we love strong.

"Take your time," he whispers. Our lips touch when he speaks and before we can connect again, there are feet on the stares. Inuyasha is watching us with a wry grin, making me immediately pull back.

"I'm at the rink from six to seven thirty most mornings. Kaede's Figure Skating School. It's in Lakewood. Come on, I'll help you get back up the stairs."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment and kudo


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin files the complaint against Byakuya. Sesshomaru waits for Rin to make up her mind.
> 
> Just a personal update. My computer is going into the shop for some repairs. My E key isn't working and it needs a new battery. This will be the last update until August I assume. Because of the pandemic the repair dudes are all backed up.

If you are wondering if I managed to get back up the stairs, the answer is yes and no. Going down is much easier than getting up. Halfway, I was winded from the effort and for the first time in a long time, I wasn't embarrassed to ask for help. Inuyasha helped to get me up the last few steps, dragging me under the arms while Rin adjusted my legs. I expected at the top of the stairs to have an audience, but Shippo and Kohaku were on the couch in the living room watching Captain America, completely oblivious and uninterested in the gimpy ex-Olympian.

Miroku and Sango spoke quietly by the dining room table, sipping strong smelling coffee. "I told you," Rin laughed as she helped put my legs back on the stand on the chair, "no one was watching." As she got up, she leaned over my lap and kissed my cheek. "You're something else Takahashi." And then she joined her brothers on the couch.

By the time I was ready to leave, I was invited to the Stonewall to watch Kohaku play, free Tai Chi from Miroku who told me he runs a class for paraplegics on Thursday mornings in Lakewood, and was somehow roped into helping Sango plant a garden. What she doesn't know is that you have to start with seedlings indoors and transplant them after the last frost. I promised to plant them for her and bring them in the spring.

We attempted to convince Rin to let us give her a ride home, but she refused, looking rather shell shocked and a part of me worries I went too far kissing her.

"So?" Inuyasha's cheeks bloom with color. He turns the wheel as we pull out of the drive. He looks like a child that was just given a candy.

"So what?"

"You were kissing her."

"A reluctant participant." I touch my lips, tasting the lingering salt of her lips. "She wants to be friends."

"Ouch," he clenches his teeth. "Friend zone."

"Friends with hope for the future," I try to plead my case, but just like she said, someone else might come along for me. I wonder if someone else will come along for her. Someone who can stand by her side and be what I can't.

"What does that mean?"

"I don't know."

I can tell you it means that when she comes to my house for the next week, she's distant. Little of the conversation revolves around what happened in her home. That when I try to engage her conversation that isn't related to work she is distant and moves it back to toning my muscles and how to regain the core strength I've lost over time.

By Friday, before the weekend, before I won't see her again until Monday, I can't take it any longer. As she's heading for the door, I catch her wrist. "Rin, what's going on?"

"I'm leaving?" she gazes at me completely confused.

"I see that and you know that's not what I'm asking."

Her face changes, highlighting the fading yellow and brown underneath her eye where she was hit before. She stares at the ground and then takes a deep breath. "I'm...look I know we kissed, but, I'm in the middle of dealing with Bya and I can't do this right now. Please? Just let me deal with this."

"You reported him?"

"And he's not happy about it and the police might want to call and talk to you and," she takes out her phone and shows me saved messages. "He threatened me and you and my job." Tears peek out of the corner of her eyes. "Just let me get through this? Please?"

"Bastard," I whisper. "They can call. You don't have to go through this alone."

"I'm not, my family is with me."

It's how we spend several weeks in a holding pattern. Each time it seems we are getting close, she retreats. She keeps a facade of professionalism when I'm well enough to return to Band of Seven, but every so often I see her watching me, more than needed. Her hands linger on my neck and back, where she knows I can feel them. Several times she accompanies me to the door, with the same look on her face as before we kissed. But as she said, we're friends and so I live my life, as I did before.

One afternoon, I wake to the sounds of Inuyasha and Kagome talking. "What are you doing?" Inuyasha whispers.

"Taking a picture. They're so cute!" Kagome squeals. She has always been the kind that swoons. Her favorite movie is "The Notebook" and no matter how many times Allie and Noah die together in the end, she bawls like it's the first time.

"No photo-ops," I mumble, pushing myself up on my side.

"Come on! You two are so cute!" Kagome squeaks again. "Don't be so grumpy."

With a bicep covered in drool, I slide my arm out from under Kieran, careful not to jostle him so he stays asleep. It's late in the afternoon, nearing five o'clock. "I should be heading home."

"I'll give you a ride," Inuyasha tells me, but I wave him off. In the last two months, it's become painfully obvious to me how much I've relied on everyone around me. It's not that hard using public transportation to get home.

With winter in full swing, it's time to begin seeding. The next day while I watch Kieran, we go to Lowes to buy seeds. Many of my plants will grow on their own, but I prefer to start with seedlings.

Bundling a two year old should be considered an Olympic sport. Kieran fights with me at first until I remind him that he will get to ride on Uncle Sesshomaru's chair. Then he stops and allows me to put a sweater, coat, hat and gloves on him. I grab a blanket for his legs and my own.

One day a year ago when he was too young to tell me, he cried the entire time we were out. I didn't know until we got home that it was because his legs were cold. His toes were blue from cold. So were mine, but again I feel nothing below my navel. I load him onto my lap and head out the door.

Kieran has been trained to stay on my lap when we are out. When he was little I had a strap around my waist to keep him on. If it sounds cruel, just imagine trying to wheel yourself down the street with a toddler who keeps trying to slide off. We conditioned him to love baby carriers, Beco and Baby K'tans and then eventually a long cloth to wrap around his and my waist. Now at two and a half, he sits happily on my lap.

A bus ride later, with comments of how cute he is, we get off and head into the store. Kieran loves Lowes. The last time we were here I bought him his own gardening set. He is very excited to help Uncle Shosho this year.

We stop by the flower seeds first. Gardens grow best when pollinated by bees. I entice them to my garden by providing them with roses, lilies and lavender. "Pink, Unkie Shosho!" His chubby finger jabs out at Peonies.

"Pink huh?" I'm on a budget. Sadly, I must skip the Peonies. They don't grow well anyway, only lasting the beginning of spring and then leaving behind their petals.

My checking account is in dire straits. I make just enough from disability to pay for taxes and insurance on my home with little left over for anything else. It's why I lied to my old man to get the garden. Trust me, at least once a week, I stare at my shrine and wonder if I should sell a metal or two to stretch my finances or the $25,000 dollar engagement ring sitting in my top drawer that was meant for Kagura. I'm not ready to part with either. Although she never wore the ring, it's all I have left of her.

I had a trust fund once, but dear old dad stipulated that I can only access the funds if I go to college and gain employment, doing something besides wasting my life.

Academia was never my strong suit. I barely passed English, but I was good at math and Science. History was my worst enemy, because I daydreamed about flips and flying through the air rather than focusing on when the Civil war began.

"Oh hey!"

At first I ignore the voice, because let's face it, I don't have friends. Most of the ones I did have couldn't handle what I became after I was injured. I was competitive, arrogant, not the friend type. Friendships were for people who had time for them and weren't going to get their asses kicked by me on the mats.

"Sesshomaru, right?"

"Hi!" Kieran calls from my lap. He's two and a half now with an expanding vocabulary.

When I glance up, I see Sango with her twins. One is in a shopping cart and the other is on her back. "I thought that was you."

"Hello," I say quickly, not entirely sure what else I should say.

Kieran is my extra set of hands. He holds our cloth shopping bag in my lap.

"Who is this little guy?"

"Kieran, my nephew."

"How do you get him to sit so nicely? Keaton's always running off." On cue, the little one starts squalling in the shopping cart.

"Proper training. He's been shopping with me since he was born."

"We really enjoyed having you for dinner the other night. How are things with you?"

I'll admit, I'm not the best at small talk. Four years of isolating myself and I forget that humans crave contact, knowledge and verbal intimacy, not to mention this one is probably sizing me up as we speak, determining if I am suitable for her sister. "Good overall."

"You're nervous to ask my baby sister out aren't you?"

I pause and start looking for a way to escape. I can't exactly squeeze past her. Metal doesn't bend.

"If I were you and I wanted to see her outside of work, I'd catch her tonight at the Stonewall. She's going with Jak and Shippo to watch Kohaku play."

"I'll keep that in mind.

"Do you need a ride home?"

"No. Kieran and I like riding the bus."

"It's cold out."

"We'll be fine. Thank you," I say, considering if I should randomly show up at the club this weekend or if I should be transparent. I haven't gone clubbing in years.

"Hey Miroku said you haven't come to Tai Chi yet. You really should."

Will there be no end to this?

"It helps with muscle pain and overall body strength. Rin would tell you the same thing."

"I'll consider it," I try to hedge the commitment.

After she leaves we move onto the herbs and vegetables. There's no space in Inuyasha and Kagome's home for a garden. So we pick up lettuce and pepper seeds. I get the usual tomatoes, cucumbers, squash and melons, until I know I'm going to drop a pretty penny, but will more than make up the money in the summer and fall when I harvest the fruits of my labor, saving money on produce at the grocery store.

Kieran happily throws the seeds at the cashier, we pay and bundle under the blanket to head back to his house. By the time we get back, my triceps and biceps are on fire. I've had much experience wheeling myself around, but invariably when I take Kieran with me and have to heft another thirty five pounds of pudgy toddler on my lap, my arms burn.

My nephew is exhausted and half asleep by the time we get back, making it easy to transfer him into his bed. Kagome is at school, taking a class on anatomy and so I am left with some quiet time.

During that time, I begin googling Rin Matthews. I've all but avoided it before. She was an adorable little thing. Where female gymnasts are often muscle bound, Rin was more willowy, but with large leg muscles. She was a fiery dancer and was known for pushing the boundaries of jumps that female skaters typically avoided. I became entranced by the scoring system, how she would save the most difficult techniques for the end where points were added because the skater's stamina decreases by the end.

"Hey," Inuyasha calls, opening the door. "Ready to go?"

"Go where?"

"It's two forty-five. PT."

Blinking several times, I glance at my watch. So it is and I had completely forgotten. My arms are still sore, my abs hurt and to be honest I'm not sure I want to. "I think I'll miss today."

"You okay?" Inuyasha comes around just as the door opens and Kagome comes in.

"Is Kieran asleep?" she asks.

"He took a late nap. We went to the store," I inform her while still flipping through pictures of Rin on my phone.

"I'm going to go lay down," Kagome says. Her eyes are ringed in black circles.

"You're sore, aren't you?" Inuyasha has an uncanny ability to sense what is wrong with me. He has since I was first injured, but then again how could he not? He has been by my bedside since the accident daily. He is the one that has shared meals with me, encouraging me from the sidelines and if I'm honest, the one that has kept me from rolling in front of a train and ending it all.

"A little."

"A little or a lot?"

"A lot," I sigh, giving in. It isn't the first time he's seen me in pain. No one tells you what neurogenic pain feels like. It's the kind that crushes you, but that you shouldn't be able to feel. It's almost torture, to feel pain where I can't feel at all, but not feel what I want.

"Back?"

"Lumbar, where it always is."

"I'll get a hot/cold pack." He goes around to the kitchen where he keeps them in plenty for me. "Tell her and maybe work on something else. That's what she's there for. Is that all?" Leaning forward over my knees, he puts it on my lower back, an area that is constantly plagued by pain.

"Friends," I say, repeating what she had said the other night. "She's been distant. Whatever ground I gained, I lost." They have a large window in their kitching. The grey clouds and growing cold catch my attention.

Inuyasha joins me, staring out the window. "I wish I had an answer for you. I want it to work out between the two of you."

I tell him how I saw her sister today and that she said to go clubbing tonight. With glee, my brother convinces me to go. They might even hire Shiori so they can go with me. But the issue then becomes, I am not much of a night owl. One more thing that paralysis has ruined for me. If I am overtired, everything is that much harder and hurts more. "So spend the night after. You can sleep in Kieran's room. You know he loves it when he gets to sleep in our bed. I'll clean his room up and we both know I keep extra supplies for you."

"Maybe I will." I resolve to go to PT even though I don't feel like it.

Without speaking, Inuyasha takes the bars from behind my back, giving my arms a break and we head downstairs. Despite the fact that Band of Seven is only three blocks from his house, we get in the car anyway. It's frigid again and neither one of us feels like freezing.

This time, I ask to be dropped off outside. It's not that I am embarrassed to be seen with my brother. I crave more independence as of late.

When I enter, Rin is busy with an elderly woman, helping her walk along the parallel bars. She passes a comment to a teenager who is doing exercises on a ball and then she sees me. A slight smile crosses her lips and I can't help it, mine twitch in response. After divesting myself of my layers, I wheel myself into the locker room to change. It is easier to exercise in shorts, especially when it gives her skilled hands access to my skin. I've chosen a black tank top and grey shorts for today. I already know how to warm up on my own. I begin with simple stretches on the mat. "Hey look at you sliding out the chair like a pro!" Jakotsu hoots, and I swear in that moment, I wish for his death.

"It's because he has a crush on Rin," Danny giggles happily. In the last month the boy has gone from learning to stand and balance to taking small steps.

"Stop picking on him," Rin finally speaks between her other clients. "How are you feeling today?" She stops by me with her clipboard in hand.

"Fine," I lie, but grunt as my arms make wide circles. Kieran is getting too big to be wheeled around on my lap and he is too young to be off it, and unless I find some way to rig a stroller to the front of my chair, there is no way in hell I can carry him otherwise.

"Was that a wince?" she asks, gingerly.

"My arms are sore," I say tepidly.

"Did you strain them?" She comes behind me and pushes my ponytail over my shoulder, draping it over my chest and starts massaging my neck and shoulders. Heaven is the only word that can be used to describe the magic of her hands. They glide up my neck, giving me goosebumps, down my shoulders, and then she takes my biceps. She's so close to me I can smell the coconut of her body wash. There are things called erogenous zones, areas that become more high sensitized to stimulation because of sensation lost in other areas. Fingers on my neck make me shiver and groan. I never found all of these zones on my body for lack of having a woman willing to explore them with me.

"Do you two need a room?" Jakotsu asks. "You're making a lot of noise."

"Hush you," Rin rebukes him. "Lay on your back, I'll do your chest."

"Do more than that," Jakotsu whispers under his breath.

"Jak!" Rin turns bright red.

"They sound like my parents at night." Danny takes timid steps.

Rin laughs in response. "That good huh?"

"You know I enjoy your massages," I answer honestly. Her fingers dig into my chest. I close my eyes, giving in to her care. They rub my pecs, my ribs, down my biceps and stop just above below my ribs.

"No pitching tents here, Takahashi," Jakotsu chuckles.

"He's got a boner," I hear Danny.

"I have no control over these things. Paralysis and all."

"Rin," Bankotsu calls her from the office. I lean over just in time to see a police officer in the room with them.

"I'll be back," she tells me, squeezing my hand as she goes.

"What's that about?" I lay down on my back and grab a towel to use against my heels to lift my legs.

"Wister," Jakotsu answers somberly.

She's in the office for the rest of the appointment, deflating the tent in my pants. Off and on. my eyes track to the door, searching for her. Suikotsu takes over, directing me through more passive exercises, reminding me that yes, I can do these at home. "If you want to get nerve replacement therapy, the recommendation is for the core muscles to be strong and recovery is contingent on how badly deconditioned the affected areas are."

"So you're saying I would have to work harder?" Rolling my eyes, I approach the parallel bars. "Eight minutes," biting my bottom lip, I change my mind, "no, four minutes."

"Problems?" Suikotsu asks me, concerned.

If there was one thing that stood out the most at dinner the night before was that Rin's family speaks the truth, even when it's uncomfortable. "My arms are sore."

"Well, we have jetstream baths in the back if you'd like when we finish. Four minutes, tell me when you're ready."

I've always enjoyed the way the bars make my palms sweat, the feel of wood and how it digs into my skin. Lifting myself up, I straighten the areas of my body I have control over. Focus is the key. When your body burns, to think of anything else but the pain. I take my mind to a green pasture, the wind blows, the sky is clear. Green grass tickles my toes, because in my dream I can feel that.

The dream ends with my arms shaking and Rin leaving the office with a tears stained face. Jakotsu follows her. Instinct drives me to do the same. I've never liked witnessing a female cry, but there's something more raw about it being because of something that happened on my account.

"Easy," Suikotsu says to me, making sure I land in my wheelchair, not on my ass. "She'll be fine. Come with me, I'll show you the tubs."

There is a room in the back with six jet-stream tubs. Three are outfitted with swinging doors. He hands me a robe and a towel. I take a minute to come my hair out with my fingers and then braid it. I used to wear it short until I fell. Then, along with the stripes on my face and hips, I grew my hair out. It now sits around my waist. I've been in these tubs before, many times to deal with the pain in my injury sight. Just as I'm transferring and naked down to my boxers, the door swings open.

My fingers fumble. I nearly fall on the ground. Rin squeaks and turns around. "I'm sorry! Are you decent?"

"Perfectly," I lie, sliding into the tub and closing the door.

"Are you going to flash me?"

"If I did?" I test the water, letting it run over my wrists. Even that feels like heaven. New calluses grace my palms on a daily basis.

"I might like it," she chuckles, turning around.

The door opens again and Jakotsu grins at me, flashing his teeth. "Mmmh-mmh."

"You know that could be seen as sexual harassment?" I crack one eye at him.

"I just ate an amazing long john, all creamy on the inside," Jakotsu confesses, but Rin slapping him gives the lie away. "What?"

"I came in here to talk to him privately," Rin motions with her head for the door.

"Right. Look, we're closing up shop soon. Try not to get in with him," Jak chuckles.

"Jak!" she screams at him. "I'm going to kill you."

"You love me and you know it baby. We still going out tonight?"

"Of course."

"You bring that skimpy black dress I told you too?"

"JAK! I'm sorry. He's…well he's just ridiculous."

"Who's wearing the skimpy black dress? You or him?" I ask her.

"You know he'd probably look better in it," she says, pushing Jakotsu out the door and shutting it behind him.

"What happened? You were crying before."

She sits on the side of the tub and as if we are more than what we are, my hand glides on top of hers, cupping it, caressing her skin. "He got fired," she mutters and the tears bloom in her eyes again.

"Who?"

"Byakuya Wister. The hospital fired him and the charges were lowered, he pled guilty. I'm sorry," she whispers, wiping her eyes.

"It's okay." I sit up, or try to, but I'm starting to float. A part of me wants to embrace her, to hold her tightly, let her know that it's okay.

"No, it's not…I've been distant because I've been dealing with this for the last month and I don't know. I told you, I'm not girlfriend material right now."

"It's alright. I told you, I'll wait." I am about to say so that she would not have to go through this alone, but she isn't. She has an entire family waiting for her, friends. It is I who have had to spend the last few weeks alone.

"I wanted to. Especially because you could have been brought in as a witness. He threatened me at first, that if I said something, he would turn it on you, but then Bankotsu and Suikotsu got him to plea guilty to a misdemeanor and he lost his job at the hospital." Tears pour from her eyes like raindrops. I smear them off her cheeks with wet, heated fingers.

When she breaks down completely, she leans over me, pressing her forehead into mine. I feel hands slide into the hair by my ears, sending shivers down my spine. "You give me so much strength, Sesshomaru. Thank you."

"Me?" No matter how I try, the words can't rise above a whisper. "What strength?"

"One day you'll see it. I went skating again because you challenged me. I said something because you were there with me when he hit me. I'm sorry. I didn't want to involve you in this."

If it wouldn't get her in trouble, my nose would rise, revealing my lips and I would taste her mouth again. Instead I cup her hands in mine, reveling in the security that I give her, that I don't even feel in myself. But if I had to recount how my life has changed in the last month from knowing her. I am stronger, in less pain and the world seems less dark than it was before. "Do you want to come to the Stonewall? I'm going to watch Kohaku play. Jak is coming. It'll be fun. We could dance."

"I can't walk—"

"Why do you always do that?" She pulls away from me, with a pained expression. "I don't care that you can't walk, we talked about this."

I stumble for words, trying to come up with an excuse.

"You can still dance and we can still have a good time."

My mouth opens and closes.

"You aren't getting out of this Sesshomaru. Why do you do that?"

By now the tub is full and she walks behind me, starting the jet bubbles. I lean against the side of the tub, letting the hot water and streams of air beat at my arms. "You would be the first woman to not care that I cannot walk. One day, you'll see it."

"See what?"

"What everyone else does."

"They aren't looking at what matters." She palms my chest and our hands touch again. "You are a good man."

How does she do this to me? In the tub, vulnerable and when a month ago I felt as if I had nothing, she makes me feel like a man.

At home, Inuyasha and I sit together on his couch reading Kieran a book. He tells his parents about his trip to the store today. Kagome is half asleep in a reclining chair, already dressed in pajamas. After kissing Kieran goodnight, my brother calls their baby whisperer. He has another rotation tonight. Something else I know he does for me.

Because he leaves his rotation twice to ensure I get to PT, the time is made up after his son is in bed. He still has access to his trust fund, unlike me, because he has entered into a reputable vocation, whereas I am nothing but a waste according to our father.

When he comes back, I tell him, "I am invited to join her at the Stonewall tonight."

"As a friend."

"Friend."

Inuyasha smiles and bumps my wrist. "Well then we should get you cleaned up. Shiori will be here in half an hour."

Inuyasha and I wear the same size and his clothing is much more fashionable than mine. While Kagome sleeps on the recliner, we find comfortable form fitting blue jeans and a sleek black button down shirt to wear. "How much do you know about nerve transplant therapy?" I ask my brother.

"I know that it's been proven effective in the upper body. Arms, hands to different degrees for different patients. The back is still in the experimental phases. They expect to start the first round of non-experimental patients in the spring, why?"

I purse my lips, staring at myself in the mirror. Sometimes I imagine my toes twitching, my knees moving at my command rather than their own accord. "I hate this chair."

He doesn't speak. Much like the first time I broke down in front of him. It was after the suicide attempt. He was in the hospital with me and eventually the psych ward where I was placed on a three day hold and then encouraged to, "get help". For my brother's sake and see my nephew grow, I did.

I discovered I had developed anxiety, depression and PTSD. I already knew that it was not normal to wake in sweats, shaking, afraid that I had fallen again and couldn't breathe. But Inuyasha was there when I woke from a nightmare. If I could have jolted upright, I would have. Instead I curled around the blankets like they were a body to hold. I woke up gasping so sure that I wouldn't be able to move my arms or breathe on my own.

Inuyasha was there with his arms on my shoulders. "It was just a dream. You're okay."

It was the first time I fell into his arms crying. I had enough. I wanted to walk again, to compete, to feel anything below my navel. I cried as if I was a child again and the entire time my little brother comforted me. It was after that he decided to specialize in neurology, if nothing more than to rescue his older brother from this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE COMMENT AND KUDO!!!


	13. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Sesshomaru meet at the stone wall and things begin to heat up. Facing our demons isn't always easy. 
> 
> Computer was fixed way faster than I thought it would be. Apparently a Dime size piece of lint was stuck underneath my E key...no wonder it wouldn't work!!

**Rin**

Jak and I get off at the same time on Fridays. We walk home arm in arm. Really we're going clubbing tonight because he wants to pick up a guy he saw a few weeks ago. I'm going because of our unspoken family rule that no one performs without someone in the family with them.

Kohaku started playing when his mother was sick and continued to vacillate back and forth between skating and music, until music won out. He plays almost anything he can get his hands. When he sings, I get lost in the sound of the alto of his voice. He even made a recording of traditional lullabies from around the world for Keaton and Kelsey.

"So you have a good talk with Puddles?"

"Stop calling him that!" I slap Jak's chest. "He's not that bad."

"Says the woman who hasn't had to work with him for the last four years."

"Neither have you," I remind him.

"Honey, you forget that I had to work for my brothers since I was fourteen."

"Life of orphans right?"

"Yes ma'am. If Ban and Sui hadn't busted their asses to make money, we'd all be fucked. We'd a been shipped off to foster care and there are seven of us, you think it would have been altogether? Hell no. Our parents weren't smart like yours. They didn't have an insurance plan, a will, nothing. Ban was in college for business and Sui just started pre-med and they gave up everything for the first three years to prove they were fit caregivers. One by one we went to college. We all slaved for money. For us younger ones it's been easier. I saw his ass right out of rehab. You kiss him while he was in that tub?"

"No."

"What the hell is wrong with you?" He grabs me by the elbow, spinning me around. "You make out with him a month ago and now you don't take advantage of his naked ass in the tub?"

"Because that would be so professional?"

"Who's professional? You're scared aren't you?" He holds up a hand and waves it in my face to stop me talking. "Don't want to hear the excuses. Are you scared because of what happened with Wister or because you tested positive for the cancer gene?"

With a trembling lip I confess, "both. Bya was such an ass, Jak." I am so tired of crying over this. "And yes the positive doesn't help either."

"Sesshomaru Takahashi is an ass who likes to pick but he's not abusive. Damn if I am defending Puddles." He rubs his nose. "And as for that gene. You can't stop living life before life happens. Then what? You repeat what happened on the ice ten years ago and we both know you have regretted it ever since."

Snorting back tears I nod my head. "I want to compete again this summer but I have to be able to land a triple. My legs aren't conditioned enough for that yet."

"So go on a diet and start lifting weights." He slides his arm through mine again and leads me towards his house. "And lose that cherry already. Woman your age should have had it popped already."

After going back to work the day after Sesshomaru had dinner with us, I was dragged into Bankotsu's office. Sitting down with members of the medical board, they reminded me how serious making complaints like this was. I felt like I couldn't breathe. We went through my original statement and then added in pieces from when Bya and I were dating. Of course I understood that if the allegation was unfounded that Bya would get off and I would ruin my reputation.

The entire time I cursed my luck with men. Shippo may have been the first boy I brought home and fooled around with, but there were others. Riley, a guy when I was sixteen. I hid the fact that I was in College because I didn't want him to think that he was so beneath me intellectually.

One evening, when he was supposed to be in the family room with me, watching movies with my brothers, I found him in front of my Shrine, going through my medals. He shit his pants, because he figured out who I was. He proceeded to take selfies and then posted them on social media. It was the first time I was accused by the media of being a slut and a major reason I've kept a private life since leaving the sport.

Jason was the next guy. He was in grad-school and I had just turned eighteen, opening up a plethora of possibilities. I was no longer jailbait. We spent our first date downtown, posing next to the fine carved art, dancing between the water jets in City Square.

He was twenty six. That probably should have been my first clue that something was wrong, or that I was in over my head. He was the first guy I went down on. There was something fascinating about watching the changes in his face as I licked his abs and how he went to a place of ecstasy when I licked his tip, but like the rest, he didn't understand why I still lived at home. Then he found the trophy case and it came out again, Rin Matthews easy. He got his five minutes of fame while I lived in months of shame. I swore off intimacy and men. The next time I opened my heart and my body for a man, it would be for love, because god knows you get shit on when you're a celebrity, even a has been.

I thought Byakuya was it. But his issues were different. For his part, at least he never released our photos, kept my face off social media. He had to, it wasn't just my image he was protecting by doing it.

It's why I pulled away from Sesshomaru. I know he's like me, but it's like I'm a magnet for shitty men.

But that morning, before I had to make the final statement to the police and agree to the charges being dropped, Kaede made me sit down and talk about it. "What's going on? Your heart hasn't been in it the last month."

"I told you I'm not doing this to compete."

"No, but your heart was in it before." She sat down, I think I heard every one of her old bones creak. "What's going on?"

I told her about Sesshomaru and about Byakuya and how I never find good men. "You know why you sell yourself short with men right?"

"Because I'm an idiot and have bad luck?" I started to rub my feet, trying to calm the ache in my arch.

"Because you are scared." Kaede is from the old country where girls and boys were married off by their parents. "Byakuya sounds like an ass, but Sesshomaru. He sounds like a nice man. Paraplegia is not something easy to adapt to. I remember hearing about him. It's a coaches worst fear when their athlete goes down."

"Speaking from experience?"

"You lost a part of yourself that day Rin," she told me and pulled me into a big hug, pressing my face into her black fur parka. "More than what you lost when your mother died."

"You're going to make me cry."

"I'm serious. You buried yourself in skating to escape the pain of your mother dying but once that was gone, you buried yourself in academics. Relationships mean vulnerability and love. If you pick the bad ones you can say you're cursed, that you like bad men, but look what happened when a good guy came along? What did you do?"

"Pushed him away," I muttered. "How are you so good at this?"

"Forty years of marriage, you learn a few things about keeping things together. When you go to work today, I want you to be vulnerable with him. Let him see you. Are you feeling okay?" She touched my forehead.

"I have pressure around my nose," I told her.

"Did you give any more thought to skating the qualifying rounds in June?"

"I don't know."

"Land a triple and you're back in the game."

"You make it sound so easy."

"It always was for you. A few more weeks and your body will remember what it's supposed to do."

The Stonewall is in downtown Denver. It's named the Stonewall, because the walls are made of large stones both inside and outside. Cliché right? The band is in the middle on a circular stage. Singing lead is my brother.

Jak kisses me on the cheek and then leaves me alone, because he's already found that hot guy from two weeks ago. Like always, I run near the stage and get Kohaku's attention. He raises a fisted-hand to me. "Rock on!" I yell back, so proud of him. If he had wanted, he could have gone to college first, but he had no idea what he wanted to do, so he let me go ahead of him.

A hand ghosting up my thigh makes me jump and I'm about to punch the offending groper when I see Sesshomaru behind me, with a smug look on his face. "You!" I push him backwards and trust me, it's fun because he didn't put his breaks on and now I'm in control.

The bands starts playing, "Shape of You" by Ed Sheeran. I spin him around and then get in front of Sesshomaru and start swaying my hips slowly for him to watch.

He watches, mesmerized. God he is so beautiful. Predatory eyes gaze at me like they could devour me. He slides his hands up my thighs, making my breath catch. His fingers dimple into my rib cage.

Twirling, I dance around his chair, from one side to the other, kicking my legs out, avoiding the other bodies in the room. "Think you can lift me?" I tease him, bringing my mouth close to his, feigning like I'm going to kiss him. Putting my hands on his shoulders, his hands find my stomach and lift me up, making me giggle. I repeat circling his chair, swaying my hips near his face. His hands grip my backside, pulling me backwards against his lap. I try to escape, but let's face it, I know which one of us is stronger. The music changes to, "Best Part of Me".

Kohaku loves Ed Sheeran, his band plays it all the time. He starts singing the song with so much emotion, I feel myself being lulled into Sesshomaru's arms.

To my shock, Sesshomaru starts singing it in my ears. His arms wrap around my waist. I lean into his chest. He smells like pine and something else fresh. He's warm and comforting. We sway back and forth to the music.

His hands, it's the first time I notice that those marks of rebellion are also on his wrists. They travel up the center of my stomach making my breath catch, down my hips and then I feel lips at the base of my skull, my neck, and my shoulder. When our lips meet, the world is quiet besides the music. All I want is to melt into his arms, into his voice. He breaks between our mouths meeting to keep singing to me. His voice isn't as clean as Kohaku's, but beautiful nonetheless.

The band takes a break after, but our lips don't. With my back pressed into his chest, I'm about to deepen the kiss when a cough takes me, then another and another. The pressure behind my eyes has gotten worse and suddenly I'm not feeling very good. "Are you alright?"

"No," I whine, "I think I'm getting sick," I yell into his ear because it's still so loud I can't even hear myself.

He presses his lips against my forehead and then the back of his hand. "Your skin is hot."

"I shouldn't be sitting on you. I'm sorry!" I try to bolt off his lap, but he catches me, cupping my chin to say, "It's alright. Do you want to go home?"

"I probably should. Let me tell Kohaku I'm leaving, he'll get worried and Jak. I'll be right back." Oh, I should have recognized the symptoms of this cold long before this. I woke up not feeling myself anyway. I thought it was just the lingering depression from dealing with everything.

I slide off his lap, slightly guilty that I've exposed him to whatever I have. Kohaku is by the bar getting a drink and flirting with some girl wearing a tight red skirt. She gives me one of those _he's mine_ looks, after I tell him that I don't feel good and he spends several minutes puttering and fussing over my temperature. He tells me he'll take me home himself, but I assure him that Sesshomaru is a fine escort and that we'll be fine.

After that, Jak is in a corner of the dance floor getting it on with that fly boy he had told me about earlier. Jakotsu takes his time feeling my forehead, offers to leave with me but then says, "you gonna let that fine boy take you home? Maybe he'll give you a ride!"

"Jak!"

"Oh don't look so offended that dumpling is long overdue and we both know it."

Sesshomaru is easy to find. He's wheeled himself to the back of the club where the coats are and together we bundle to stay warm. Ever since landing this job, I've gone back and forth over whether or not to buy a car, to spend more money, but I'm up to my eyeballs in student loans and Kohaku and I have lived so cheaply, not to mention it's my turn to start chipping into Kohaku's college account. "Come on." Sesshomaru gives my wrist a tug, reminding me that I need to leave.

The winter air is crisp when we leave. It prickles my cheeks and makes me feel like I can breathe again. My trunk is burning, but my ears feel like they're going to fall off the second we leave the room. "Do you want an Uber?"

"No. I'll take the bus," I start walking down the street rubbing my head, while texting Ban that I've got a fever. To minimize exposure to clients, it's possible if it doesn't resolve itself and I'm still sick come Monday that I won't be able to work.

"I'll cover it," he tells me, catching up.

"It's okay. I'll be fine. I'm used to bussing." We stop at a bus shelter. I sit down on the edge where the space is the widest between the bench and the wall. "You should go back and have fun."

"My reason for staying is leaving."

"You don't need me to have fun."

"I honestly haven't been to a club since before, back when the ladies would throw themselves at me."

"I knew you were a ladies man. I read this tabloid that said you were a player."

"You've been reading about me?"

"As if you haven't been reading about me."

"A few articles. Like how you got your GED at fourteen so you could focus fully on the sport, or that you were set to win had you not gotten hurt. Your technical scores far outweighed the competitors."

"Yep," the coughs roll through me again. "I was set for gold. Some people said I didn't even need to skate. Just give me the medal."

The bus comes and kneels for Sesshomaru. I get on after him, watching curiously as he's secured in the handicap spot. "Which stop?"

"Monaco."

He nods. "The only thing I didn't read is what happened to your father."

"Oh dad," the sting is still there. "Mom said, that she was young and stupid with him. He was attractive, popular, gorgeous, charismatic. They fell in love right away, married quickly and then she was pregnant with me and that was where the problems got bad. They got worse though when my aunt Rina got sick. At first, my mom quit her job to take care of her sister, but my dad blew his top. He made barely enough to cover the bills and he thought it was a waste of time. Then Rina got so sick she needed help with her kids. Mom told her to move in. Dad told her no. Mom said either accept them or leave, so he left. I haven't seen him since."

"And I thought I had a lousy dad. He didn't show after your mother died?"

"You would think he would have. Sango told me that the money that was left behind was contingent on Kohaku being adopted with me. If Sango took us both in, she got my mom's life insurance policy. It was enough to keep us afloat and the figure skating families and board pulled together another couple hundred thousand. But Dad…he wanted me to get the insurance policy, but not Kohaku. No Kohaku, no money, no dad."

I lean over and put my chin on his shoulder. "What about your dad?"

"You've read my file."

"That doesn't explain a lot."

"It explains enough."

"No it doesn't. It doesn't explain how he's present and not at the same time or why you live with your mom, who doesn't exactly seem like a responsible caregiver—"

"I would rather a father that abandoned me to the one I have. You have no idea what it's like, having him so close and so far away at the same time. To achieve what I did and still, it wasn't enough." His voice rises above the roar of the engine. His knuckles turn white against the arm rests. He's pissed.

"Then tell me?"

"Why?"

"Because I want to know you and you aren't making it very easy."

His head falls slightly just as the bus rounds a sharp corner. "He's disappointed in me. He always has been." He pauses. His shoulders rise as he takes a deep breath. "It started with having a wife that was more in love with the bottle than she was with him and then she put me in gymkhana. I loved it. I was good at it. She used to sit on the sidelines, cheering me on. She volunteered for everything, baking, cooking, chaperone for competitions and the entire time, dad wanted me to play something more manly. Baseball, basketball, football. He thought I would quit in middle school when the competition and expectations became more fierce. All it did was make me more determined. I just wanted him to see me, but he never would. The first gold medal I won, I thought it would convince him that it wasn't a waste of time and everyone after that, he refused to come. I can count on one hand how many competitions he went to, how many times it was Inuyasha in the stands. But mom, she was always there. So you can imagine I do not feel shame even if she is buried in the bottle more often than not."

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have made assumptions."

"You have no idea what my life has been like for the last four years."

"I can't."

"Loneliness, exhaustion."

"Hopelessness?"

"She's been there for all of them. When I've fallen and couldn't get up. When I wanted to die. This is your stop."

"You coming?" I tug the cord to signal the stop and stand up next to him.

He gives me a quizzical look.

"Well you did offer to take me home."

The bus rolls to a stop and the driver frees the chair. We exit together and then walk towards my apartment. It's two blocks from here in a quiet, although cheap neighborhood. "You probably wonder why I haven't moved on," he says bitterly, rolling leisurely next to me.

"No."

"No?"

"Well, in my experience and from my classes, it doesn't happen overnight. The first year is spent getting used to your new body, more surgeries, relearning activities that you could do blindfolded before. And the second year, well that's all mental. It's like once you get the hang of managing the new physical aspects of paralysis then comes the mental part. So you spend another year, sometimes even two figuring out what the hell you are going to do now. I'd assume you're right on track."

He chuckles. "So you don't concur with my father's assessment?"

"He sounds like an asshole. You haven't had a lot of support and for most people after a life-altering injury that's paramount to recovery."

"Speaking from experience?"

"They smothered me. I thought I was going to suffocate from the love. I woke up in so much pain and they were all there, Shippo, Kohaku, Sango and Miroku. To be honest, that's where a lot of our money went. I racked up so many thousands in medical bills and surgeries and we had insurance…but damn. Six months after, when the pain subsided and I was somewhat mobile, that's when I decided to go to college. So yeah, I had support."

"Lucky you."

"Guess so."

My head starts to hurt and the fever makes me feel like at any moment I'm going to pass out.

"Are you alright?"

"A little dizzy. I feel like I'm on fire."

"Sit." He motions to his lap.

He doesn't have to tell me twice. I sidle up on him and turn so my legs don't block the wheels or his hands. "I have to be heavier than your nephew."

"But I'm not taking you grocery shopping and carrying bags at the same time. Which way?"

He stops at the lip of a sidewalk.

"Left. Those townhouses over there."

"Do you have soup?"

"No. I could ask Kohaku to go to Trader Joes and buy me some."

"Boxed soup when you are sick? No," he shakes his head, "no wonder you're in poor health. I'll make something for you."

"It's late."

"It's alright."

"I might fall asleep."

"So be it. Do you have a crockpot?"

"Yes."

"Then we'll be fine."

The second we get in my apartment it becomes painfully obvious that there's no way that Sesshomaru is going to be able to navigate my home. And I'm so exhausted, it feels like my head is in a vice and despite all of that I start pushing furniture out of the way so he can maneuver easily.

The average wheelchair is thirty-two inches in width. Imagine if the average waistline for a man is around twenty inches, all of a sudden you have an extra foot to manage. That's what Sesshomaru has to deal with and in his case, his hip width was probably smaller before the accident. "You don't have to move everything."

"It's fine. I don't mind." I start coughing again and this time I feel it in my head, down my spine and up my legs. "I'm going to go change."

I go to my room and start stripping off my coat, feeling instant relief from the heat and then kick my shoes off. My arches ache. Why can't they make heels that don't hurt the female foot?

Reaching for my zipper, my fingers sloppily grip the end and it snags on the fabric of my slinky black dress. "Shit!"

"Are you alright?" There's clattering in the kitchen, drawers opening and closing.

"My zipper's stuck," I say, whining and then coming out of the room, holding my pajamas in one hand. They're comfy thin cotton capris pants with a loose T-shirt. "Can you help me? My hands are too sweaty to get the zipper loose."

"Sure." I know that sound in his voice. It's low and husky and his Adam's apple moves as he swallows.

I turn around and sit on his knees, feeling my skin tingle when his fingers touch my skin. "Your skin is so hot. Did you take your temperature?"

"No. Can you get it loose?"

"You snagged the fabric."

I feel tugging on the fabric and then the crunch of the teeth finally coming apart. Then lips, hot lips on my back, and suction on my already burning skin that makes me gasp. His hands grip my hips, rocking me against his knee until my nether regions bump his knee cap, sending a shockwave of heat up my middle. He sucks on the small of my back, up my spine, one shoulder and then the other. "Do you usually try to take advantage of sick damsels?"

His breath beats against my back as he laughs. "You are the epitome of a damsel in distress."

His finger grazes against my shoulder blades, pushing the shoulder straps down. I catch the fabric before my breasts are exposed. "Stop."

He pauses and doesn't move. I get off his lap in a hurry, suddenly feeling very nervous, aroused and antsy more than anything. It's not that I wouldn't make love to him, but I don't want to, not yet.

"Rin?" He follows after me.

"It's fine." I shut the door halfway and start changing. Just because I don't want to have sex doesn't mean he can't enjoying peeping, which I know he is. I come out without a bra on making him pant. "Like what you saw?"

"I think you are confusing me."

I've brought a pillow and a blanket with and lay down on the couch. He wheels himself back to our open kitchen. It's small, barely the size of a bathroom and a half with a countertop that separates it from the living room. He would make me feel like I have a fire between my legs too that has nothing to do with being sick. "What are you making?"

He's holding a cutting board and several vegetables. He brings them to the table and starts cutting, onions, carrots, potatoes and celery. "Vegetable soup with loads of garlic. You'll feel some relief quickly."

"Thanks," I mutter. Now that I'm horizontal, the effects of the fever and exhaustion kick in brutally. "God my head hurts."

"Do you want something for it?"

"We have some ibuprofen in the bathroom but I'm not sure it's accessible for you."

"Then good for you, I keep some in my wheelchair."

"I thought you took Percocet for the pain?"

"I have Percocet, I don't take it, unless the pain is unbearable." He pulls a dirty glass off the counter, and washes it in the sink. After filling it, he brings it over to me and starts digging in the side of his wheelchair. He takes out a giant bag of prescription medications and pulls out Advil for me. "Two?"

"Yeah."

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like you pity me."

"Not pity." I handle the bag a little. "Just guessing you were very healthy before and now you have a long list of medications to handle a long list of new health problems. I guess I feel for you."

"You feel bad for me?"

"Yes…no…" Downing the pills I answer more truthfully, "I guess I feel bad you haven't had a lot of support since it happened but also that you've had to make so many difficult changes. But if it didn't happen, you and I would never have met."

His face breaks into a half grin as he puts the bag away. "I'm also glad we met. Did I make you uncomfortable before?"

"Yes and no. I liked what you were doing to my back." My throat cracks with a giant yawn. "But…with Bya, I kind of rushed into the relationship. Kind of how I think my mom did with my dad. I didn't know him well enough and all of a sudden we were being intimate, and together all the time and I missed all the warning signs that it was a very bad idea, until that night he hit me."

"Did he do more than hit you?"

"No. I kneed him in the crotch, trust me, he wasn't _up_ for much of anything after that." We both start laughing. "But that's not what it is. I like you. I'm just not ready to be intimate yet."

He pulls the blanket over my shoulder and kisses my cheek. "So this is us, not being together?"

"You might find someone else you know."

"I doubt it. The first thing women see when they look at me is this chair and trust me, it's not a turn on."

"Then those women are dumb. Did you finish the soup?"

"It's in the crock pot. I'd guess you can turn it off in four hours or so, but it will taste even better if it slow cooks overnight."

"You should probably go."

Hurt flashes across his eyes, creasing the sides of his face. Releasing the break on the wheels, he flings himself backwards.

"Wait," it comes out panicked. "It's not you…it's just," I pause, biting my lower lip.

"That you don't want this with me—"

"No!"

"Then what is it?" His eyes roll in annoyance. It's almost cute in a pathetic kind of way.

"If you would stop being so angry I would tell you that you aren't the only one with ghosts in your past."

He stops and exhales. "What ghosts?"

"If I tell you, promise me you won't tell anyone else?"

He nods.

"Only my family knows."

"I won't tell anyone. What is it?" His face is serious, I hear it in how he speaks.

"Well…" Coughing, I exhale again. "So the night my mom died. We read a book. She was in a hospital bed in the living room. She wanted to be with us, every second that she could before... Every minute she could manage. She read, 'No Matter What' by Debbi Gliori," my voice breaks, tears brim in my eyes. "It's about a parent passing away. She knew," I wipe my eyes, "I'm sorry."

"Hey," he whispers, moving closer to me, lifting my head and pressing his forehead against mine. "It's okay."

"I fell asleep in her arms and when I woke up the next morning she was gone. The nurse said…she p-p-passed in her sleep. I couldn't," I whisper, "I couldn't sleep for a long time after that unless I was exhausted and even now, if I fall asleep and you're gone when I wake up, I'll panic. It doesn't happen often, only when someone I care about is here when I sleep and gone when I wake up."

"You care about me?"

"Dufus, how many times are you going to make me say it?" I mutter and kiss his lips for good measure. I'm not sure what's hotter, him or my lips against his. "Thank you for making the soup and taking me home."

His breath comes out against my cheek. "And here I thought you were going to tell me some deep dark secret."

"It's dark enough."

"I could think of darker ones." He checks his phone again.

"So can I. I got lucky. That never happened to me while I was competing. But you know how mental health is. I'm a physical therapist. People look at me to be this calm, stable pillar of support and deep down, I'm just a human like everyone else. Anxiety and all."

"I know anxiety well enough."

"I know."

"You know all my dark secrets. All you have to do is look in my medical files and they are bare to you. I guess that's what makes it easier talking to you, Rin."

"You're easy to talk to, too. It doesn't feel forced. You should come for Thanksgiving! It's in two weeks. We have a noisy meal, then everyone falls asleep. Do you want to come?"

"I'll let you know."

"Okay." It comes out disappointed. I was hoping he would just say yes. "I'm going to get you sick."

"I'll be fine. Eat the soup in the morning." He takes his phone out and tells me, "What's your address? My brother will get me."

I prattle it off quickly for him and snuggled into my pillow. "I feel horrible. This came out of nowhere."

He presses his lips to my forehead, making my breath catch. "I enjoyed tonight, even if your frail body got to you. You'll be alright alone?"

"I'm not alone. Kohaku will come home in a few hours. If I don't feel better by Sunday I'll go to Urgent care. No making anyone cry if I miss a few sessions next week."

He winks at me, face covered in mischief.

"I wish you could stay the night." I let my head lull to the side and close my eyes.

"Another night. Rin," he says more gravely and then stops.

"Huh?" I can feel his hands in my hair, gathering it around my neck and then weaving it into a braid. "That feels good."

Lips lick my skin, tasting my sweat. "I wish I could stay too."

"Then why don't you?"

"I need supplies. Another time."

Lucky me, I wake in a panic the second the door squeaks open around three in the morning. "MOM!" I feel foreign hands on mine, nails and then arms wrapping around me.

"Hey it's okay," a tenor floats into my ears.

"Hey," Kohaku runs over to me, dropping his instruments in the doorway. He kneels in front of me, holding my shoulders. Suddenly I'm being held by two men. "What are you doing here?"

"I didn't feel right leaving her alone. She's very hot and I don't mean attractive, she is attractive, that isn't what I meant-"

"Save it," Kohaku tells him.

I can still see her body sometimes, the lifeless eyes staring at me. She died watching me sleep. She was so skinny, there was nothing left of her. "Where is she?"

My eyes finally adjust to see Sesshomaru next to my head and Kohaku in front of me.

Kohaku and I have been through this so many times. He takes out a photo album from our end table and hands it to me. It starts with her holding me the day I was born. The pictures always seem to help. Then he sings and my heart responds to the notes in his voice. She used to sing Baby Mine to me all the time when I was little. He rocks me against his chest until I'm calm again. "Shit," I whisper to him, still feeling shaken.

"You're boiling. I should take your temperature."

"It's okay," I try to convince him.

"What's that smell?"

"Soup. It will be ready in the morning," Sesshomaru yawns out.

"Uh-huh," Kohaku grins like he's a child again. "So you two didn't?"

"No!" But it doesn't stop me from flopping on my side and laying my head against Sesshomaru's hands. "Why didn't you go home?"

"I didn't feel right leaving you like this. You'll be alright now?" Leaning down, he kisses my forehead.

"Yeah. Hak will take care of me."

"I've got her. Besides, you don't know the recipe for the panic," humor floats out of Kohaku's voice.

Sesshomaru, instead of answering, leans down and kisses my neck and then my head. "Feel better. I'll see you next week." He leaves, closing the door behind him.

"I thought we talked about honey chamomile and chocolate chips being a secret," I scold Kohaku. "Ugh I feel terrible."

"My lips are sealed," Kohaku laughs, putting our electric kettle onto boil. "Need help getting into bed?"

"I'll sleep in here tonight then. Just in case anything happens."

"Nothing's going to happen Hak, it's just a cold."

He flinches, eyes flashing with pain. It wasn't the cancer that killed Rina, it was an opportunistic virus, most likely the flu. "I'm sleeping in here."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> KUDO....Comment!! I love hearing from you!!


	14. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru wakes after the late night with Rin and then they find more time to spend together.

**Sesshomaru**

If there is one thing I hate about sleeping in Kieran's room, it's that he wakes up before the sun does and no matter how Inuyasha shushes him and tells him not to wake his Uncle, inevitably they wake me up and on nights like last night, when I was up entirely too late, nausea sets in, along with dizziness that makes my head spin. "Go back to sleep," my brother tells me. Easy for him to say. The only other issue with this bed is that there are no rails for me to hold onto. True, most paraplegics don't need them, but when you've been lazy for years, moving on a fluffy bouncy surface isn't so easy.

I've learned sleeping on my sides is easiest, so I take my legs in one hand and pull myself onto my other side and attempt to force my body to sleep again.

My back aches, returns for sleeping next to her. I leaned over the arm of the sofa, close enough to smell the oils in her hair and keep a hand against her neck, feeling the sweltering heat of her skin. Leaving would have been the right choice, but I couldn't. She looked so pathetic and she said she panics in her sleep at times. I let my mind drift as I slept, dreaming of a life with her, with someone who acts so naturally around me. One day, I told myself, one day.

Hours later, little hands tug on my hair. "Hi!"

"Kieran," I reprimand him, pulling my mane out of his hands. "We don't pull Uncle Shosho's hair."

"Long hair!" he giggles and climbs into the bed. He throws a book at my face, clocking my nose with the cardboard surface. "Read!"

"Green Eggs and Ham?"

"Eggs and Ham!" he parrots me, straddling my hips and then resting his head beneath my chin. "Sam I am no eggs and ham! Eggs icky!"

"Only when mommy makes them."

"Shosho better."

"Don't tell your mother that. Green Eggs and Ham," I start and kiss the top of his head.

By the time we've finished Kagome is at the door watching us with a wistful smile on her face. "You two look good together."

The air smells foul. I pull back the top of Kieran's diaper, grateful it's the weekend and not one of the days I'm watching him. "This one is yours."

"Kieran, come on. Time to change your diaper. How'd it go last night?" She sets my nephew on the floor and props a leg on top of him. He squirms and kicks, laughing the entire time he tries to get away. These days he doesn't want to be changed and I'm plotting excuses to send them on a vacation alone and potty train him.

"Well enough."

"Oh don't be so tight lipped. Did you kiss her?" Kagome smiles, but then her face changes as she continues the wrestling match with Kieran.

"All done!" Kieran screams.

"Not with poop on your butt!" she yells back.

"You know you could just potty train him," I remind her.

"I don't have time to," she whines. "And no changing the subject. Did you kiss her?"

"She got sick before the night was over. Fever. That's why Inuyasha picked me up from her home."

"Are you going out again?" Inuyasha asks, leaning on the door frame with a book in his hands about various neurological conditions. He's still trying to fix me.

"She asked me to Thanksgiving dinner," I say rather proudly and start the arduous task of forcing my body up.

"Need help?" Inuyasha asks me.

"No. It's much easier now…" I stop myself from saying now that I have been working with Rin. I start by pushing up on my palms behind my back until I'm upright enough to support my weight on one arm. When I say I have no sensation below my navel it means that the muscles there are like jelly, which means my arms do the majority of work to get me upright.

Kagome has finished with Kieran. He jumps in my lap, begging for a ride. "Only to the bathroom, little man."

I let him off at the door. Maneuvering their bathroom is like playing bumper cars. It's one of those thin rectangular arrangements that leaves little room for my chair, much less for me to get on the toilet.

Timing is everything in my life. It's already ten which means I am lucky that my body didn't empty itself unexpectedly and that I need to take my morning laxative. There's a reason I don't like going out at night. But last night was worth it. I did peep while she was changing. She's beautiful.

Say what you want about body types, but I prefer women who have curves. Her hips are wide, giving her a plump bottom that curves into a beautiful well-endowed chest. She's not skinny by any means. I like what I saw.

Breakfast is on the table for me when I finish. Kieran is busy with Kagome. She's dressing him for the cold, letting me know that she is taking him grocery shopping so Inuyasha can study. Just as she leaves, Inuyasha tells me, "Actually, can you watch him for a few hours tomorrow? I have another test next week and Kagome has a big paper due."

"Sure." The highlights of my week are usually with Kieran, that was until I met Rin.

"So she asked you to Thanksgiving dinner?"

"Yes."

"You look proud."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

He hands me some orange juice and broiled eggs. "There's only one problem."

"What's that?"

"We're having Thanksgiving here and we were going to invite you—"

"She asked first, sorry to disappoint you."

"I promised Dad you would be there."

"What?"

"Well, Dad said he hadn't seen or heard from you in a while so I told him you'd eat with us for Thanksgiving."

"No," I say firmly.

"You can't blame him for being pissed."

"Yes I can."

"You told him you needed $25,000 to upgrade your house and get a better wheelchair, not make a garden."

"A garden that makes me feel like I can do something, rather than can't. And that's not the only reason I want nothing to do with that man."

"Here we go…"

"Why would I want anything to do with someone who never came to one competition? One medal ceremony, who didn't care when I went to the Olympics over and over. You know I was dumb enough to believe that if I won every medal out there that my father would see that I wasn't wasting my time, that I was living up to his expectations and then this happens!" Slamming my palms against the wheels of the chair, I keep going, "Do you know what it's like to spend day after day in a hospital alone? To go through rehab alone? To hear him trash-talk my mother when she was the only one that stayed with me?"

"I stayed with you too!"

"A few hours a day—"

"I fell behind in school for those few hours a day!"

"I'm not talking about you Inuyasha! I'm talking about me and going through hell for four years and having a father who didn't even care…" a lump forms in my throat. "Who wasn't even there…"

"Wasn't there when you tried to kill yourself?" Inuyasha fills the words in for me, cupping my hands. There are things said only between brother's and this is one of them.

"I know," he whispers. "If it helps I'm also a disappointment."

"His favorite disappointment." My forehead falls against my knuckles. "At least he'll come when you graduate in the spring and he let you keep your trust fund."

"What would you do with that fund?" Inuyasha asks, sitting down next to me with his own cup of orange juice. "Plant an Orchard?"

"Nerve transplant therapy."

"Really?" His eyes widen.

"Why not? How sound is the technique?"

"It has a seventy percent success rate for upper-body mobility but the test cases for lower extremities are just undergoing the surgery starting this week through the next month. It can take 8-12 weeks for feeling to return, so I would say we won't know it's validity until at least February. Medicaid won't cover it. You're thinking about asking dad."

"No, I'm thinking you should ask our father if he would spare $50,000 so his son can walk again," sardonically, I answer him.

"You know he won't touch it until we know the medicine is sound. You're looking at March to even get in to see a doctor and probably no surgery until the summer. Not to mention, muscular-wise and core control, you'll want to be in better shape than you are now."

"But you do know the doctors running the study?" I start on the eggs, eating them slowly.

"There are a few. Dr. Okata, Japan, Dr. Hazan from Israel and Dr. Jameson from here and Dr. Shepherd from London."

"The question is, can my brother help me get an appointment earlier to see them and determine if I am eligible?"

Inuyasha's lips quirk into a smile. "You're brother interned under them for a rotation and I'm interviewing with their department to match for residency."

"That's right, I forgot. Where else are you interviewing?"

"Just locally."

I slam my cup down on the table. "We both know that's not going to work. You have to get your name out there or you won't match. You can leave. I'll be fine."

His face falls, contorted with pain.

"You can't watch me forever. It's time to live your life Inuyasha. Apply for other opportunities. We both know you deserve it, you've worked hard for it. Don't trap yourself here because of me."

"I'll make a deal with you," Inuyasha says wryly and then a grin spreads across his face, the same one that kept him out of trouble when we were children. "You have Thanksgiving dinner with us and I'll talk to the secretary the next time I'm in the office. She has a crush on me."

"Does she know you're married?"

"You know I told her that and her response was, 'and?'" He rolls his eyes and finishes his orange juice.

"I'll come to Thanksgiving dinner here if you start trying to match out of state."

"I can live with that. In a rush to get home?"

"Not really…I planned to spend the morning seeding."

"Good, let's go bowling." Inuyasha claps me on the back. "Brother time."

Seeding is a relaxing task. I've learned that most plants need time in the winter for their roots to take and that winter is fickle in Denver. We have snows as late as June, which is the purpose of my large windows and patio doors. They heat the stale cold of my tiled floors with the rays of the sun. In essence, I have my greenhouse.

Against the far wall of my bedroom, across from my bed and dresser are long thin tables. They're organized by species, peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, melons, squash, zucchini.

Kieran is in a box in the middle of the room being my right hand man. I've filled the box with fresh soil and small biodegradable pots to transfer them into the soil after the last frost. He's covered in dirt from head to toe, which contrasts his shaggy white hair. "Not in your mouth," I remind him for the second time. This time I stop putting seeds in the small pots and go over to his box. "Kieran, look at me."

His golden eyes raise up, wide and so deceitfully innocent.

"If you do that again, I'm going to take you out of the dirt. No mouth. Do you understand?"

He smiles and nods.

His job is to fill my biodegradable seed starters so I can put the seeds in and water them. It's a messy job, even messier with a two and a half year old assistant.

"He's adorable," mother says, from the hallway.

"You say that every time I bring him over," I remind her.

"And a good helper," she kneels down by the box, wobbling on her way down, reeking of alcohol. "How old is he now?"

"Get out." I wheel around to face her.

"What?"

"You're drunk, get out."

"Sesshomaru—"

"He doesn't need to see it."

"Since when do you care?" her voice falls. She's hurt and I don't care. I may have spent a lifetime tolerating her alcoholism but foisting that on my nephew is another thing all together.

"You think it doesn't affect me that you're so drunk every afternoon that you can't see straight? Or that every time I go to the doctor or to therapy that it's written in my notes that my mother is a raging alcoholic or that when I'm sick with pneumonia you're trashed and don't visit!?"

Her eyes web in pain and rather than face it, she runs from the room.

There are memories I would rather not have. Like the first time she came to one of my practices drunk. She had driven so erratically I'm surprised we didn't get pulled over. She ran a red light and nearly hit the car in front of her. By the time we got to practice she was so frazzled she couldn't see straight or walk in a straight line.

She had brought cupcakes and put them on a fancy tray for the end of the week party when we got to splurge. I was ten years old. I knew she was drunk. I prayed that she passed out in the car but she didn't. Instead she humiliated me by coming into the gym, swaggering the entire time, barely able to walk in a straight line.

She slurred her words talking to the other parents. I tried to pretend that I didn't notice how loud she was talking, how obnoxious she was being, until she vomited all over the floor while I was landing a simple flip off the parallel bar. Instead of landing on my feet, I landed on my stomach, jarring my left shoulder so badly I couldn't move it after. It was the first of many bones I broke competing.

I suffered through the coach calling my father, who was furious that my arm was in a splint. He did nothing to help my mother. He took me from her care for months after that accusing her of negligence. That was the first time she went to rehab.

During that time, he tried to convince me that I wasn't cut out for gymnastics. That dislocating my shoulder was proof of that. I ended up running off more times than I can count to my gym to train and keep myself in shape until I was healed.

When she came back, she stayed sober for all of three months before she relapsed. All it took was the stress of raising an active child, losing her job and feeling hopeless. I know the feeling well. Hopelessness, helplessness. I gave alcoholism a try and ended with more UTIs than I can count.

"Well," I say to Kieran, "How about a bath?"

Days pass and Rin doesn't return to work. I'm not surprised, she looked like hell when I left her in bed on Friday night. Fighting with Suikotsu doesn't seem as exciting as it once did. I spend time on the parallel bars, this time lifting myself up and then lowering myself until my triceps start hurting. We work more on my core muscles and even he has an opinion on the surgery. "It's risky."

"Meaning?" I grunt out through a series of painful sit ups to strengthen my stomach.

"There are the obvious risks with surgery, lay back, combined with the risk of mental health. Many patients expect a miracle. Even if sensation returns," he begins stretching my legs, bending my knee up to stomach and back. Each time, I tighten my abs, reminding them what the motion is supposed to feel like. "You'll spend several years rebuilding muscle in your legs and the effected abdominal muscles. In essence, you won't be walking overnight."

I nod and begin thinking. I'm no stranger to hard work. Gymnasts spend at least six hours a day in the gym. Some of it is on the mats and the various apparatuses, another is lifting weights, push-ups, sit-ups, pullups. There were days I came home and soaked in ice baths to calm the burn in my muscles, then got up and did it again the next morning. I'm used to hard work. When Suikotsu finishes with me, he motions Jakotsu over.

"Oh baby, I've been looking forward to this for months. Get your scrawny ass on the table—"

"Jak!" Suikotsu yells, looking how I feel inside. I'd love to kill him.

"What, he has a scrawny backside, like someone took all the fluff out of it. Get up there and I'm going to rub you down."

Well, it was a good day.

By the end of the week Rin's back and trust me, it's been the longest week of my life and I'm very grateful that she is here, because that means I no longer have to work with Jakotsu who spends entirely too much time massaging my ass and commenting on how bony it is. "No brother today?" She still sounds a bit off.

"I thought I would change things up a bit and start bringing myself. It is only a few blocks and the sidewalks have been mostly clean lately."

"Then let's get to work on those core muscles."

She gets me on the floor doing sit-ups as well as I can and using a stretchy cloth to lift my own legs to work on my circulation, after that we shift to my stomach to do press-ups, modified push-ups. I can't lift my legs up but I can my core. She has other patients now and is unable to focus one on one with me, except for the end when she gives me the massage that I have missed so much. "Jak said you were polite."

"I bet he thought I was flirting."

"He's seeing someone you know. Get up on the table."

It's much easier now to pull myself onto the table and lay on my stomach. "Are you feeling better?"

"Mostly. I'm lucky they're so normal here. There was some back office stuff they needed done, so I focused on that and only had to use a few days of vacation. Did you think about Thanksgiving?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"No."

Her face falls, filling with disappointment that makes me feel like I've been punched in the stomach. "I made a deal with Inuyasha. He's going to start applying outside of Denver to match for residency and I'll bare, fuck that hurts!" I grip the sides of the bed.

"Sorry!" Fingers press down against my spine, making me jolt in pain that I hadn't noticed before. "Here?"

"Yes."

"It's bulging a little. I'll get a hot compress for it. One second." She runs off into one of the supply closets and comes back out with a disposable hot pad to put on my back. "Better? What did you do this week?"

"Ask him," I eye Jakotsu warily

"Jak I told you not to break him," she teases, flirting with the long haired bastard.

"Honey, I left plenty for you," he calls over his shoulder. "Look at you Danny!" The child is taking his first steps with crutches. His parents are there taking pictures and smiling. It infectious, making me smile too.

"How long has he been coming here?"

"Long before I came. Although when he did, he was wheelchair bound," I answer her. "He's come a long way."

"Where's the sarcastic comment?" She pushes on my backside, just under where my muscles hurt the worst.

"Buried." Because one day, I also want to defy the odds, to feel my feet beneath me, even if I will never run or move like I did before.

"Well, a girl could always dream of bringing a hot guy home for Thanksgiving dinner. They've been asking about you anyway. Maybe Christmas."

"Maybe. I'm more of a grinch."

"Really? I never would have guessed. What do you do for Christmas?"

"Nothing really. We put up a tree and if she's not drunk, go out to eat." I avoid telling her that is also when my checking account begins running painfully thin and I begin the task of gathering my documents to get my refund faster. "What do you do? Go to church? Hail Mary?"

"No." She starts on my shoulders. "We put a tree up at Miroku and Sango's to start. Then we go to visit my mom and Rina at the cemetery. After that, it's food, food and more food until we all pass out. This year we have the twins though. It's their first Christmas, so we might go all crazy. Plus, Shippo is bringing Kanta and Kohaku might bring one of his exploits and then there's me."

"To which you'll go stag."

"I could think of someone to bring with. You could bring your mom but I'm hiding the booze."

"She'd be passed out before she could come."

"Ouch."

"What if we went to both on Thanksgiving? I'll come to your dinner and you save me from mine? My father would be less likely to remind me how much I've disappointed him if I brought a beautiful woman with me."

"Mmmh, let me ask my sister what time we're eating. We usually eat around three, so after that sure. Should I bring anything?"

"Should I?"

"Your secret to growing plants. I told Sango about your garden and she wants help in the Spring. Seriously, she kills everything she comes in contact with."

"I'll think about it."

"Well if you want, I'll be at the rink next week for a few hours in the morning on Thanksgiving and Friday."

"Skating during the holidays? One would think you were training for something." Closing my eyes, I release a tense groan. Every time she touches my neck, my stomach tightens and a burning sensation grows in my stomach.

"Denver Invitational and Denver Championships. They're in May."

"I knew you wouldn't be able to stay away from competition."

"And why is that?"

"Because it's in your bones. Like it's in mine."

The shower water is hot against my skin. I lean against the wall in front of me letting it pelt the part of my back that still feels like it's on fire. Pain is the worst. Neurogenic pain is even harder to tolerate because it radiates from the areas I shouldn't be able to feel. Moments like these are why I turn to Percocet. Advil doesn't touch the pain, so I wait, unsure if I'll be able to get back to Inuyasha's. I had planned on riding the bus home myself.

Growing pressure in my abdomen reminds me that I need to catch myself, so I turn the water off and get back into my chair, wiping the hot moisture from my skin. Even my fingers are shaking from the pain. Taking myself into the large stall, I begin the effort of relieving myself. There are many different ways to do this, the easiest is with a catheter for me and when my fingers slide along the straw, too sweat soaked to get a good grip or be able to insert it, I turn to the bottle to pee in. But even then, my body isn't releasing. In annoyance, I groan and beat the back of my head against the wall.

"You okay in here?"

"Do you always come in the men's bathroom?"

Rin chuckles. I see her maroon scrubs and white shoes. "Only when my patients take forever and make me worry. Problems?"

"You could say that." Mournfully I stare at the bottle cupping my penis.

"Can I come in?"

"No!"

"Why not? I'm trained with this. I could call Jak if you need help."

"Vixen, I'm naked."

"He'll love that." I hear some rustling and then the nob starts turning. "Do you want to get modest?" She comes in and closes the door behind her, looking at the bottle below. "Problems urinating?"

"This is humiliating."

"It shouldn't be. Your not the first male I've helped."

"Everything okay in here?" Jak yells.

"Fine!" we say in unison and then she gets on her knees in front of me. "The catheter isn't working? Want me to put pressure on your abdomen?"

"You really want to help me with this?" A part of me doesn't believe this, that seeing me like this wouldn't send her fleeing, running the other direction.

"I can help with the cath if you're okay with me touching your penis, I'll use gloves."

I had it in mind that one day she would touch my penis and I would get to watch because of course, I do not feel even that, but to stick s slurpy straw up my urethra is not what I had in mind.

"Which one? Pressure or the straw?" She puts her hand on my lower abdomen, just below my navel. I can't feel it, but there is something erotic about seeing her so close to my intimate parts.

"Try pressure."

"Lean back and relax. Sorry if it hurts," she says as she pushes hard on my stomach.

"I can't feel anything there anyway."

"Just relax."

"Naked in the bathroom with a beautiful woman and she wants me to relax."

"Don't you start giving him a hand job!" Jak snipes over the top of the stall. "And if you do I need to observe. To make sure it's proper and for scientific research."

"Jak hush!" She pushes again, encouraging a small trickle but not enough. "Straw it is. Are you okay with this?"

"Considering the option is letting my sister-in-law do it at home…" I shrug and close my eyes, forcing my cheeks not to redden and also so I don't have to watch while she handles me.

I hear the break of plastic and take a deep breath in, then the sounds of movement below. Her knuckles brush against the top of my navel, just where I begin to have feeling, making suck in air. "Okay?"

"Great." I lie. Then I hear the steady trickle of urine into the bottle from the tube, and the slow release of pressure.

"I'll let you finish up." She throws her gloves into the trash and steps out the door with a blush on her cheeks and leaving me with a partially erect shaft. Great, Sesshomaru Takahashi gets female to touch his dick but only after she feels bad for him and he humiliates himself.

On the way out she follows me to the door. "So Thanksgiving right? I can tell Sango you're coming?"

Stopping myself, I gaze at her and nod, surprising even myself.

"Good, because I didn't want you to get shy after that."

The pain in my back doesn't leave by the end of the session, leaving me feeling exhausted and emotionally drained. There are days, all I can do is endure the pain. Instead of taking busses home, Inuyasha drives me, alleviating the extra work on my part it would take to get home.

Pulling up in the drive, the house is dark, where the lights should be on. Winters are dark in Denver, dark and cold. "Should I go in with you?"

"No. I know how to call an ambulance if she's drowned in alcohol again. What time are you calling Thanksgiving for?" That doesn't alleviate my clenching stomach. This wouldn't be the first time that mom has drunk herself into an alcoholic coma and needed her stomach pumped. The first time I was twelve. She fell over in the bathroom, cracking her head on the porcelain seat, covered in blood. I called an ambulance and lied through my teeth during a social workers visit because I didn't want to stop seeing my mother.

"Five, I hope, if we can get all the cooking done. Kagome is freaking out. Mom and dad are coming, her mom and brother and grandfather and now you and Rin, plus Kieran. Ten people is a lot and she's finishing exams that week too and I have a bunch of rotations."

"Tell her I'll make the pies and the salads. Five?"

"Yep."

I swing out of the car after I've put my wheelchair back together. "I'll tell her."

I start looking for mom the second my wheels grace the ramp up to my door. I don't see her on the couch in the window which is the most likely spot besides her bed. Opening the door, I call out for her, but as soon as I switch the light on, I find a letter left on the table by the door. _I've gone to rehab. I'm sorry I'm such an embarrassment. Love, mom._

And suddenly, my home feels that much more empty.


	15. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanksgiving has come and what happens brings Rin and Sesshomaru closer together.

**Rin**

In my head, I know how to do this. Right left, set up across the ice. It's Thanksgiving morning, so the rink is empty. Kaede gave me an extra set of keys so I could have the rink to myself for the next two days and not have to pay for it. If I want to in the Denver Invitational and Colorado Championships in May, I have to get in shape now, ballet like yesterday and triples. My worst fear.

It would be easier to jump higher if I dropped fifteen pounds before trying this but I don't have time. The trick with some jumps depends on which side of your blades you put your pressure in and the toe pick is important. That's how you get your bounce.

I pass the backboard several times, making sure I have the lay of the ice before I set up the jump. I'm doing a triple sachow. You need speed to throw these jumps and the ability to get enough inertia from spinning. It's like wiping out but not and then landing them is even harder. Speed picks up the closer the wall approaches. I force my toe pick in and leap into the air, spinning but as soon as I try to land, my landing leg buckles, I flop on my ass and then slide back first into the wall, bumping my head. "Fuck!"

Clapping from the sidelines catches my attention. Sesshomaru's sitting at the lip of the ice with a smug look on his face as if me falling is the highlight of his morning. "How'd you get in?"

"You left the doors unlocked."

"Shit! Any chance you'd lock them for me? I think I broke my ass." I slide down the ice, letting it chill my bruised back. Who needs an ice pack when you have an ice rink to lay on.

"Need help getting up?" he calls across the ice.

"Nope. Just an ambulance, maybe a cute doctor to make out with."

"I'll make out with you," he chortles as he rolls off and disappears behind the bleachers.

"What am I doing wrong?" I force myself off the ground. This is the seventh time I've landed on my ass this morning. No matter how I try I can't get the last rotation in and when I do, I land on my ass or my back, once my stomach.

Just as I get over the lip of the ice to sit on the bleachers, Sesshomaru is back with a bag of ice from one of the drink machines. "Thanks."

"What hurts more, your head or your back?"

"Back." I whine, and lift up my skin tight shirt over my shoulders, letting it dangle around my neck. "Right shoulder and my tailbone."

I feel warm hands on my shoulder and back and then the cold back of ice. "I've seen worse," he reassures me.

"Bruised?"

"Battered. Is there a trick to it? Is it like the grand Jete?"

"Kind of, but instead of spinning horizontal, you go vertical. You took ballet too?"

"It helps flexibility and control no matter the sport you play. Shall I video record you? Help you see what you are doing wrong?"

I take my phone out and lean into the hands holding the ice. There's plenty of examples online of how to do this jump properly. We go through several videos, explaining how to make the jump properly. "Think you have it?" I ask him.

"Fairly certain."

"Good, come on the ice and record me." I pull my purple shirt back down.

"You expect me to come on the ice in a wheelchair?"

"You've seen Mighty Ducks three right? Come on." I grab him by the handles and push him onto the ice before he can stop me.

"Did anyone tell you it's bad form to push the chair without consent?"

I don't answer. Left to his own devices, Sesshomaru would spend the rest of his life living on the sidelines. I put him in the middle of the rink where he can get a good view of me and start again. "Ready?"

"If I fall on the ice because of you—"

"I'll tend your wounds, Takashi. Don't be scared." I lean over his back, breathing against the skin of his neck. "Is it your first time? Ice virgin?"

His adam's apple moves against my mouth when he swallows. "I skated leisurely before."

I lean in, just enough to tease him and then pull back before he can lay one on me. "So you have nothing to worry about." Blasting away from him, I get the next jump set up. My backside hurts but I push through the pain and get into position. There's this thing called televising the jump, which I am totally doing, but I don't care, because as long as I get the rotations in at this point that's all that matters.

This time I go up, and once again buckle on the landing, but at least I catch myself before I hit the ice. "Ahhh! What am I doing wrong?"

Sesshomaru motions me over and together we watch the video he took of me trying the jump. "Are you getting high enough to get all the rotations in. Right there, when you landed, you were twisting out when your foot came down."

"I think that's it, so I either need to jump higher or spin faster."

"Are you locking your arms and legs tightly enough?"

"I can try it again, coach." I elbow him playfully and skate off again, getting ready to make the jump once more "Stop watching my ass."

"Why would I do that? When you bend over to skate backwards it pops out so nicely!"

This time I focus more on getting enough height and spinning fast enough. As I do, I feel my heart start to pound in my fingertips. Breathing gets difficult. This time I don't even make it to set the jump up. The panic comes over me so quickly, I'm almost not aware of it, before I'm on my knees, trying to force air through my lungs.

"Rin!"

There are wheels in front of me, knees and hands digging around my face, looking for my chin. "Easy. What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

"No." I shake my head, still trembling. I hate panic attacks. I used to have them all the time after my mom died and again after I broke my knee. "I'm scared, Sesshomaru." I climb into his lap and hold onto his shoulders.

"Panic attack?"

I nod my head, trying to focus on my breathing. I've coached people through these, you would think I could manage and not have a complete freak out.

"Breathe. Shh, it's okay." He rubs my back and kisses my cheek. "Listen to me, did I ever tell you the time I had a complete melt down at Worlds? The first time I went, the crowd was larger than any I had ever been in front of before. I knew the cameras were watching me. I knew that they thought I was the best, that I was meant to take home the gold. Everyone expected it. I was so overwhelmed by how many people were there, the attention that when it came to warm up, I felt like I couldn't breathe. I went to the doctor, convinced that I was having an adolescent heart attack. It was just anxiety. I threw up on his shoes."

"That happened to me a few times, anxiety and throwing up from nerves. It sucks living up to the expectation doesn't it?" I focus on his breath while he speaks. The sound of his voice, the rise of his chest, grounding myself in his warmth.

"It's the best and the worst. There's no guarantee you're going to hurt yourself if you try this jump. But if you don't try, you're going to continue to ask yourself what if, Rin. Take it from someone who really can't compete again. If I could stand, if by some miracle, I could get feeling back in my legs and the strength to walk, I would run. I would jump, flip through the air. I would do it again. You can do this. Do you hear me? You can do this. Now go on. Get off me and try again."

"Thanks," I whisper leaning in to kiss him but he stops me, shaking his head.

"Make the jump, my lips will be waiting."

Taking a reassuring breath, I kiss his neck and stand back up on the ice, mentally preparing myself. I circle the backboard, then gain the speed I need to make the jump, pushing myself hard. At the last minute, leaping through the air, I spin, counting them in my head up to three and then land sloppily on my right foot, but landing nonetheless. "Yes!" I scream, jumping up and down on the ice. "I did it!" Rushing at him, I jump at Sesshomaru kissing his cheek. "I think you're my good luck charm. Now it's your turn to fly." Circling around to his back, I take him around the rink, spinning and flying until my arms are sore from pushing his weight.

While cooling down, Sesshomaru massages my shoulders. I peel the skates off my feet, wincing in pain. So typical. Skaters have nearly as bad of feet as ballet dancers. The heel on my left foot is bleeding, the arch on my right is bruised and the side of my right foot has developed a painful blister. It doesn't happen all the time, but after long periods of skating, not wearing the right socks, or learning new techniques that strain your feet, it's inevitable. At some point I'll have to sink money into custom boots so this doesn't happen.

"Is there a first aid kit?"

"In the office. If it's unlocked," I say while rubbing my feet down. Lucky for me, I know how to massage the pain from my feet. "Why'd you come anyway?"

"You said you'd be here. I didn't have much else to do this morning. I dropped off the pies and salads at Kagome's this morning. My home has been quiet."

"She must mean business this time." I try to sound sympathetic, but that was something else we had talked about casually during his massages. His mother is going to be gone for three months and he would be on his own. In the past he's always had his mother to help him and this is the first time that he's truly been alone.

"One could hope. I have more memories of my mother intoxicated than sober. She called and said she didn't want to give up this time." He wheels off, giving me time to really focus on digging my thumbs into the muscles of my feet. They're sore, my legs already feel like jelly and I'm exhausted. "Give me the feet," he says as he returns.

Propping my feet up on his knees, I lay down on my back and stare at the bright lights, yawning. "So what are you doing the rest of the morning then?" I glance at my watch, seeing it's nearing noon. On time, my stomach protests the lack of food I've eaten, while Sesshomaru bandages and massages my tired feet. His hands are dry against my skin, but then he begins massaging my feet too. "Mmmh, this is a nice change."

"I was going to go back to my brother's and take care of my nephew. Your family doesn't expect you sooner?"

"I should go help them. Want to come with me? We could ride the bus together and maybe stop off at Starbucks and get Shippo and Kohaku to sneak us something to eat. They're doing inventory. It's why we eat at three. They always work Thanksgiving. They'll get off just in time to go back."

"Sure."

We spend the day together and what strikes me most, is that we always have something to talk about. On the bus to Starbucks, he tells me more about his relationship with his brother and how despite them growing up in two different homes, they have always been close, how his father was always too buried in business. It makes me grateful for what I have and the people that have stood behind me. Maybe it's because we had no choice. When you're faced with adversity, you can either collapse or stand together.

He becomes quiet while we're sipping lattes and eating espresso brownies. I'm starving. I was at the rink for a few hours already, hence why my feet are beat up. "You're still walking tenderly."

"I broke those boots in weeks ago, but everything changes when you're skating in them for hours on end. I'm going to regret this when I have to help Sango cook."

He laughs quietly, still looking like he's thinking.

"What happened that day on the rings? I've found the video and it looks like you passed out before you hit your back, not after."

His eyes shoot up, pained. He covers it by taking a long sip of his coffee and then shakes his head.

"Don't remember or don't want to talk about it?"

He purses his lips and finally confesses, "You know anorexia isn't just a condition that affects females. I didn't have a full blown case of it but I did have a coach that constantly nagged about weight. I learned to limit what I ate, but in those weeks leading up to the fall, I wasn't eating enough. The morning of that particular competition I forgot to eat. Fatigue got to me and I have paid the price ever since."

My eyes bulge, I'm surprised they aren't rolling around on the table. What the hell? "Really? That's what happened?"

He lowers his cup and takes my hand, threading his fingers through mine. "Stupid right? Imagine the headlines, three time Olympic Gymnast Sesshomaru Takahashi falls and breaks his back because he suffers from an eating disorder."

"You're too hard on yourself."

"Too hard on myself? I fell and broke my back so badly I haven't walked since."

The words slice at me, they sting. "But it was a mistake. Do you still limit yourself?" I'm suddenly looking for knobby elbows and knees, bones sticking out and other signs he's been starving himself. His legs are skinnier than they would be, could he walk but overall, he seems to be in good condition.

He lifts up his brownie to make a point, taking a big bite. "No. It was something I worked through in rehab. Now it's just depression, anxiety, loneliness."

"It's gotta be worse without your mom there."

"Immensely," he answers seriously. "Who do you think helps when it's bad? When I'm in pain? And with other things." He glances away as he speaks.

"You mean in the bathroom?" Sometimes being forthright is better than not.

"That too," he huffs out.

Somehow I start laughing and he glares at me like I've lost my mind. "Sorry, just imagining her in the bathroom with you." Considering I have been in there twice with him, I can only imagine what it's like having your mom do that when you are a grown man. No wonder he's so angry.

He starts laughing too. "It's not pretty. She once said that she thought she was done cleaning me as an infant. The first time was humiliating but…"

"You get used to it?"

"Like you would know what it's like to have someone else wipe your ass or help you use the bathroom."

"Truth? When I first broke my leg, I couldn't stand. It hurt like hell to move. They'd put my leg up in one of those hanging contraptions so the nurses had to come and help me use the bathroom. But then they wanted my family to be able to help me and I had to have a freaking bed pan in my room and for several weeks, Sango, Shippo, Kohaku and even Miroku had to wipe my ass. I was humiliated beyond reason, am I grossing you out talking about this?"

"No, on the contrary, it's nice to hear someone else has had the pleasure of humiliation."

"Anyway, Miroku was home one day when I had the runs. It was bad." Truthfully, I would rather not think about it, but if it makes him feel better. "I couldn't even get off the bed and each time I vomited, you know that wasn't the only end it was coming out. It was probably the most humiliating thing that happened."

"Try having it happen more than once and you ask why I stay with my mother instead of living alone."

"I'm sorry. You know I can only learn so much from your file."

"How much have you read?"

"Most of it," I tell him as we finally get up to leave. "Does that bother you?"

He exhales, making me wonder what it would be like if he read mine. I was surrounded by positivity and good vibes. I spent my time studying and crying, but there was always someone to hug me and tell me it was going to be alright. Sango came with ice-cream, Kohaku with movies. I was never alone. Shippo spent the night in the rehab facility with me several times and so did Hak. I'm lucky and I know it.

"So you know I tried to kill myself?"

"I'm not surprised. It's kind of normal in cases like yours." I flick the lock shut and wave to Kohaku and Shippo.

"Did you just tell me I'm normal?" He grabs my hand and stops me from walking.

"What do you want me to tell you?" The air outside is crisp but not freezing as it has been in the past. I turn around and kneel in front of him. "You went through a life altering accident, Sesshomaru. It's normal to be pissed at the world and hate everyone, even yourself. You are the definition of normal, in fact," I say flirtatiously, "if there were a gold medal for normal, I would hang it around your neck."

He leans down until our lips are nearly touching and then presses his against mine. His tongue pushes at the entrance of my mouth and I open for him, letting him in. He flicks it against the roof of my mouth. I respond just as fervently. He tastes like coffee and chocolate. I pull back, breaking the kiss with a guilty look on my face. I shouldn't be doing this, but I can't help it. It's like fate threw me in his lap, which is where I sit down while we wait for the bus, sliding my hands under the hem of his jacket for warmth.

Thanksgiving at my house involves little fanfare. We keep it simple so no one is driven insane by cooking and cleaning. Everyone makes something and brings it to eat. Kohaku and I made some disgusting chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. Shippo made sticky rice and stir-fried vegetables. Sango and Miroku covered the rest and Sesshomaru brought a salad with a medley of vegetables, walnuts and strawberries with a sweet dressing. "This is amazing!" Sango gushes, while eating the salad. "How did you make it?"

Sesshomaru shifts nervously in his chair, and explains how he went to an organic grocer to buy the ingredients and that the dressing is made from brown sugar, vinegar, extra-virgin olive oil and wine.

He's not the only one shifting nervously in his chair. Kanta is too. Another element of my family is honesty. We don't parse words. That's something you learn quickly when dealing with family illnesses. The day we found out that Rina's illness was terminal we went to an ice-cream parlor downtown. Mom told us that the chemo wasn't working and together she and Rina decided that it was time to end treatment and let things happen naturally. We all had questions, how long, how will it happen?

Then Kohaku and Sango asked what was going to happen to them. I cried the whole time. I didn't want my aunt to die, but it was what was going to happen. We talked about how Sango and Kohaku would live with us. Sango cried and promised Kohaku it would be okay, but he was just a boy then. "Are you alright?" Sesshomaru leans over my shoulder.

"Just remembering," I whisper between bites of turkey and salad. I'm pacing myself, or at least attempting to. This has to be the last day I don't eat like I should or else I won't be light enough to get myself into the air.

"Well," Miroku begins, "I'm not one for speeches, but every Thanksgiving, I think about Rina and Henna. Sango and I met while she was still in high school. I never had the privilege of knowing her mother but every time I came over, Henna treated me like family. That was after she grilled me. I was nineteen, in my sophomore year of school and she wanted to know everything about me, down to how I planned on supporting her daughter, my wife, Sango. She told me once, that life is too short to mince words. So in that tradition, I'm going to grill the both of you," Miroku breaks out laughing. "We'll start with Kanta, there's only one rule, you must tell the truth and we will accept you no matter what."

"As long as you aren't an axe murderer," Kohaku makes us all laugh.

Again Kanta shifts and so does Sesshomaru. "You're in the hot seat now, Takahashi," I elbow him.

"It's not as bad as it sounds, you should have heard what they did to me before they would adopt me," Shippo says reassuringly to Kanta. "So many questions I nearly buckled under the pressure."

"Well, I think I'll start with Kanta then," Miroku starts in on him. Through the questions we find out that Kanta is in college right now, making him a few years younger than Shippo. He's majoring in Social Work with a minor in psychology and wants to work in the foster care system.

The questions turn to his family. I can tell by how his nose bunches around the sides and his eyes bulge that he doesn't want to answer, but in our house, it's all about honesty. Miroku's father passed when he was a boy, which is probably why Sango got along with him so well. His mother was mostly absent from his life, something my mother could never understand. Beneath the initial pain and hurt, she loved Miroku's zest for life, his positivity and how he treated Sango like a queen. _There's something beautiful about seeing someone else love your children as much as you do._

Kanta was close with his parents, up until a few years ago when he stopped fighting his feelings. He was never aroused by women, but he was by men. When he came out, his parents asked him to move out and their relationship has been on the rocks ever since. His face darkens and tears prick at the side of his eyes. "I can tell you, when Shippo decided to tell us _he thought he might be gay_ ," Miroku chuckles lightly, "he thought that he might, imagine using those words, we had a coming out cake. We frosted it with all the colors of the rainbow. No worries, sometimes it takes parents time to accept the child they have over the one they wanted."

Sesshomaru nods his head. I already know what he's thinking. He is the epitome of child failure. "Well, Sesshomaru, now it's your turn."

"I'd rather not," Sesshomaru grates out bluntly. In response, I reach under the table for one of his hands, sliding my fingers along the bumps of his palms. He turns to me, long enough for our eyes to connect.

"If only that were an option," Sango giggles between feeding the twins. They're both covered in pumpkin pie from their heads down to their toes and will need baths before the day is done. "Since we already got to know each other last time, I think we'll start with your plans for the future."

His jaw is flexing. I can see the ridges rise and fall. A pregnant pause fills the dinner table. As far as I know, he doesn't have goals. He's been a hermit, trapped in his house, trapped in the confines of his mind and the wheels of his chair. "I haven't given it much thought," he replies, deflated.

"I imagine things haven't been very easy for you in the last four years," Miroku offers a reassuring smile. "Just know the only wrong answer is not telling the truth. So why haven't you given it much thought?"

"Isn't it obvious?" he bites back, making me squeeze his hand to get him to calm down.

"What's obvious?" Miroku says blindly. "From what I see you're a capable, smart, dedicated man. What's stopping you from setting goals and living your life the way you want?"

Sesshomaru closes his eyes. Keeping a death grip on his hand, I offer my head on his shoulder to keep him from running. I haven't told my family that he lives in a richer neighborhood, but only survives because there's no mortgage and he lives off of disability. It's nothing to be ashamed of, he just hasn't figured it out that he can do more than he gives himself credit for.

When the silence remains, Miroku tries another avenue. "Let's try this, if you could have anything you wanted, within the realm of reality, it has to be grounded, what would it be?"

"I stopped considering dreams long ago," Sesshomaru answers.

Shippo and Kohaku are dead quiet, listening to it all. Kanta's face is the most shocked, but me, I'm used to hearing this. If it's the last thing I do, I'm going to teach this man to hope again.

"Excuse me," Sesshomaru says and pushes himself away from the table.

He heads for the bathroom. What no one notices but me, is the slight shake in his fingers as they leave my hand and the sheen of sweat that formed on his palms.

"Miroku you're too hard on him," scolding my big brother, I get up and run after Sesshomaru.

I find Sesshomaru just outside the bathroom, leaning over his knees, breathing hard. I know he has anxiety too, just like I do, but I've never seen it in therapy. He's always poised, unafraid. I don't ask him for permission to take him into the guest bedroom and shut the door behind us. Wheeling him to the bed, I sit down in front of him and take his hands in mine. He's quiet for once, but struggling. "Focus on my hands." I slide my fingers back into his and then pull his hands onto my knees. If I wasn't wearing pants, I would let him touch my scars again. "Focus on the ridges of my jeans, the way they curl around my knees." I let him run his hands up and down my hips, giving me goosebumps. He moves closer and wraps his arms around my waist and slides his cheek over my shoulder. "Shh, it's just panic, remember? It's not going to hurt you."

"My chest is tight," he pants out.

"It's okay," I remind him, wrapping my arms around his trunk. I lift up the back of his shirt, revealing his pale skin. He groans when I stroke his spine, breathing deeply. "Is your medicine in your chair?" I trace the length of his scars with my index finger. "You're okay."

"Yes," he whispers, barely audible.

"I'll get you something to drink."

"Stay."

"Okay."

The room is quiet while I hold him and keep pressure on his back to help him stay distracted. Slowly his body relaxes against mine and the labored breathing stops. "Okay?"

"Better. I made an ass of myself."

"No, you didn't."

"I have no goals, remember? No hopes, or dreams. What does that say about me?"

"That you're human. Look at me." I pull his face up to mine. "You don't even know all of Shippo's story. Do you know why we adopted him? His mom was in jail for possession. His father OD'd when he was four. He had no family to take him, so like many kids he ended up in foster care. Because he was so badly neglected he was mischievous. He stole food because he didn't know when he would get to eat again. He stole money, because in the time he was shipped back and forth between his family and the system there wasn't always money for clothes. His mom gave him up completely when he was eight and by then he was too old for most families to take him in. He was shipped from home to home, to home, until he lost track of how many he had been in. When he started hanging out with us around the time he was thirteen it was literally to stop his foster mom from molesting him. After one night in our home without someone crawling into his bed, he begged us to take him in. He gave us hell for the first year, until one night he broke down and asked who would love someone like him? Someone that felt like they had been used up by the time they were fourteen? We did and if you tell anyone what I just told you, I'll beat you."

He sighs, letting me know he's okay now.

"You're no different you know. We're not going to think any less of you because you don't have your life figured out. Just think about that." I kiss his cheek and pinch his chin. "I wish you saw what I did when I look at you."

Shutting the door behind me, I go to get him some water. Everyone but Kanta meets me in the kitchen. "Is he okay?" Kohaku asks.

"He's fine. Just a panic attack," I answer. "Why did you do that, Miroku?"

"You know the rules. You bring a boy home—"

"I'm not in high school anymore!" I slam the freezer shut and throw some ice into a glass.

"It doesn't matter!" Sango yells at me. "If he wants to date you, then we need to know that he is going to love you more than we do and be able to take care of you!"

"This isn't the sixties, Sango. I'm not going to be a stay at home mom!"

"And if you end up on bedrest because your pregnancy sucks like Sango's? Or it activates the BRC gene like mom?" Kohaku shoots in. "Then what? Who's going to work?"

"Oh my god…we're not getting married! We're not even dating. We're friends—"

"Friends don't lip lock in clubs," Kohaku raises an objecting hand.

"You told them about that?"

"Why wouldn't I?" Kohaku says. "Jesus Rin, the last guy you dated gave you a black eye and threatened us, you think just because this guy's in a wheelchair we're going to let him get past us without making sure he isn't going to hurt you?"

"And don't you dare say it's none of our business," Sango interjects.

I groan and lean against the wall. "Are you trying to scare him off?"

"Maybe you should stick to the physical therapy part of your job," Miroku says. "You can help make his body stronger but that's not what's hurting him, it's his mind. Personally I like him, but his mind, what happened really hurt him and I don't just mean physically."

"I'm never bringing a man home again!" I leave them to stew and go into the guest room. He's already rifling through his large bag of medicine. I hand him the cup and sit down on the bed again. "You want to lay down for a bit? It usually helps me."

He shakes his head.

"Sure about that?" I lie down on the full bed, leaving plenty of space for him.

He laughs and moves closer to the bed, transferring himself onto the bed and then adjusting his legs. He pushes his left leg and then his right leg over until he's next to me. Grasping the back of his knee, he rolls onto his side, facing me. I stroke the marks on his cheeks, his sign of rebellion. We don't speak as we lay there. As time passes, he moves closer to me and I respond. Most anti-anxiety medications take a good thirty minutes to really start working. It's why I'm not surprised he closes his eyes and looks like he's sleeping. There's a fine line between pity and sympathy. Sesshomaru Takahashi is stronger than he knows and more capable. He just hasn't figured it out yet, but the truth is, I don't care about that. All I'm thinking of while we're in bed together is how peaceful he looks.

After a time he tells me, "I did have dreams before. More than just the next Gold Medal, but knowing you, you probably already know about that too."

"I haven't read everything in your files," I yawn wide, covering my mouth and move closer, until our noses nearly touch. "I only read what was pertinent to my job."

"Which is?" he speaks with his eyes closed.

"Your PT history, mental state, physical health, family history and list of complaints from previous therapists."

"There's a section for that?" A mischievous smile cracks his features.

"For you yes. You're so grumpy no one wants to work with you."

"Except for you."

"I've dealt with worse." My fingers ghost across his cheek again, up into his hair. "At least you don't grope me."

"I could." His hand flies up my side, dangerously close to my breast.

Slapping it away, I squeak in protest, "Stop it!"

"Well since you said stop. I wanted a family. I was dating a woman, an amazing woman. I was over the moon for her." His eyes finally open.

"Kagura," I mutter under my breath.

"How do you know?"

"I interned with her and Ban told me about it. It doesn't make any sense. She's the one that taught me to believe in the heart of the patient—" his fingers over my mouth stop me.

"Stop…please." There are subtle changes in his face. A crease here, a drop of sweat so dangerously close to his eye that I wipe away with my thumb.

"Did you ever cry about it?"

"About what? Losing Kagura or myself?"

"Both."

He shakes his head.

"That's part of the reason you're so angry isn't it?"

"Only some of it." He tucks the hair behind my ear. "The rest you'll see when we go to my brother's."

I roll onto my other side and slide back into his chest, pulling his arm around me. "Before the panic came, what would you have told Miroku?"

I feel lips on the base of my skull and then on my neck. He holds me, making me drowsy and comfortable at the same time. "I wanted a family with Kagura. I would have proposed on the podium once the competition was over. We'd talked about wanting two children. Boys, because who wants to deal with female hormones. Hers were the worst. I was going to compete until I couldn't anymore and she would run Wind. I never thought of what would happen after. I still haven't. But you're living your dream aren't you?"

"Kind of. I'm sorry Sesshomaru."

"It's not you who should apologize."

"But it must have hurt."

"Why do you want to talk about her? I thought women hate hearing about past exploits?" I can feel his throat vibrating against my ear.

"I'm not like most girls and we aren't dating," I remind him, despite the position we're in. A dark room, bodies close and more than once I've felt him kiss the skin near my ear.

"Is that what this is?"

"You know the second we start dating, I can't be your PT anymore? Are you telling me you're ready to work with someone else and not be a dick?"

He doesn't answer. His breath hits me as he laughs in my ear.

"See…For your own good, we can't. But that doesn't mean we can't hang out every now and then. I'm still going to kick your ass in therapy."

"It helps. Rin, I should thank you. I haven't felt like this since before I was hurt."

"Felt what?"

"Like I can do anything. Like I can dream."

"Then dream with me." I close my eyes and snuggle into his body. "We live on a beach house, with a grassy backyard and picket fence. We have four children."

"Two."

"Three."

"Fine, but they're all boys."

"Two girls—"

"One."

"See, then why can't we have four so I get two girls and you get two boys?"

"Fine," he groans and tickles my stomach, making me jolt against his body. "But I get to name them."

"We're picking names already?"

"You know if we live on a beach, my wheels will get stuck in the sand."

"We'll pave a walkway for you that leads to the dock, so when you come home from work you can play and watch the kids swim. We'll make it ADA accessible too, so you can join them."

"And what will I do for work?"

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know."

"We're dreaming."

"I really don't know. I was never good with academics. Perchance from lack of time to actually study. If I have to support a wife and four children and pay for my medical care and do something I like…" he pauses, thinking, until the room is quiet for minutes. "Accountant maybe. Join my father after all but in all honesty, I prefer not to work with people. Coach maybe. At least I would get to be in the sport in some capacity. Writer."

"Writer?"

"I once considered writing a memoir and selling it. But who wants to hear about how I never overcame my injury."

"I'd read it." This time I'm quiet. I hold his hand, wanting to live in this moment. "Sesshomaru?"

"Mmh?"

"I tested positive for the BRCA-gene. The breast cancer gene. The one that killed my mother and my aunt." He holds me more tightly. I haven't really spoken with anyone about what being positive means, but only now, while we're in bed does it hit me, that if I married, I could leave my husband and children behind.

"What does that mean?" he asks, his voice filled with concern.

"I have to have annual mammograms and…um…Rina, my aunt, she got her first bout of cancer when she was pregnant with Kohaku. She had a mastectomy, this was before I was born. But long term? Could you love someone with no breasts?" My voice cracks and then breaks and I hide in his chest, soaking his shirt with tears.

"Rin, I'm sorry," he whispers in my ear, making me shiver. "Can you love a man that may not be able to give you children?"

"We're just dreaming right now right?" Because I can't admit that I feel more for him than friends, that I want to spend more days like this with him.

He nods.

"You have trouble ejaculating?" I snivel back my tears.

"That and arousal. I am at times, other times I'm not. I don't always reach an orgasm."

"It wouldn't matter to me."

"Do you have to have them removed?"

"It's preventative. Not now, I probably have like ten years to have kids, but I have to be monitored during pregnancy and I don't know…Kohaku and Sango's dad left them because he didn't want a wife without a rack. My dad left because he couldn't handle mom caring for Rina and then she got sick too. Why would you want the same thing?"

He strokes my cheek, wiping away my tears. "We're dreaming?"

"Yeah," I whisper.

He presses his mouth against mine. Comforting me with his lips. I return the pressure, needy and unsure of what's going to happen next. "I'd cherish every moment with you. Breasts or not." His lips fall on mine again.

Wrapping my arms around him, I bring his body closer to mine. Our tongues meet and dance together. He holds me close. I can feel the muscles of his arms flexing against my sides, like he won't let go, ever. Words die, there's nothing left for either of us to say. He touches me and I don't stop him. Hands slide down my sides, under the hem of my shirt, sliding up my skin, branding me. He pushes his fingers beneath the wire of my bra and squeezes one breast, making me moan into his mouth. He massages the nipple, sliding his tongue down my neck, pushing my head to the side. I let him, I don't want to stop him. It's not until his hand travels down my stomach to the buckle of my pants do I stop him. "You don't want to do that."

"Why not?" He pecks my lips.

"Because I'm self-conscious and on my period."

"Right." He retracts his hand and settles for resting his face on my shoulder. "When does the dream end?"

I could have stayed in the room with him for hours. But eventually Kohaku and Shippo decided they needed to "check" on us, which was probably a good thing, because we both had dreamy hands. It's around four when we exit the room, with my hair looking a bit mussed and worse for the wear. I like this man. I really like this man and I hate that if we start dating, I have to let him work with someone else.

"Good make-out session?" Sango asks us as we join the table.

Sesshomaru's mouth tightens again.

"You'll have to forgive us," Miroku bounces Keaton on his lap. "Sango and I met around fourteen years ago. She was in high school, I was in college. She was teaching a fencing course with one of the instructors and it was love at first sight. She was seventeen and I was twenty. I never knew Rina, but I feel as if I did from everything Kohaku and Sango have told me. Henna was already very sick when we met. She grilled me, like I did you. Our first date I knew that I was dealing with a mother who cared very much for her daughter. Sango called her mom. Well…six months into our relationship, Sango called me sobbing. Henna had passed away in her sleep, Sango was eighteen and Henna had asked her to care for Kohaku and Rin. Rin was twelve, Kohaku was fifteen. Suddenly I was a twenty one year old faced with a dilemma, walk away or take these two under my wing. I had no idea how to raise children, much less help them recover from the tragic loss of their parents. So Sango and I decided on two things, honesty and unconditional love. With that love," he reaches out and holds Sango's hand, "we created this small stitched together family. So you can understand why we would ask what we did Sesshomaru."

"I understand and I'm ready to answer."

I don't know about other people, but I get giddy whenever Miroku tells that story. We grew up with unconditional love and honesty. We always told the truth, at least most of the time. Miroku's biggest fear after my mother died was that we would get into drugs or something else to cope with the pain of the loss, so it was his idea to keep me enrolled in skating and when Kohaku dropped it to bury him in music. He worked extra jobs round the clock to pay for instruments and lessons and the entire time, he loved Sango like there was no tomorrow.

Sometimes I feel like we stole their time. Like they would have had kids sooner if we hadn't been thrown in their laps but they always say they wouldn't have it any other way. It's why I hold Sesshomaru's hand under the table and lean against his shoulder, because life doesn't always give us what we want it to. Legs or not, I would feel this way about him and I'm not sure how long I'll be able to keep just being friends.


	16. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's still thanksgiving, and now we get to see Toga and Rin interact.
> 
> Remember to vote fpr Fire and Ice for Best Drama 
> 
> https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSemcZSnlR5o732mVq3SiQWGDmdzCFjzb_yfo5ysI_rUTBoUpA/viewform

**Sesshomaru**

The car ride is quiet as we make it from Aurora back to Glendale. Rin borrowed her sister's car so we could stay longer and play a mean game of cripple basketball. Somehow, she had a wheelchair stashed in their garage. She told me it's easier to connect to patients if you spend a day living in their shoes, or in this case their wheels. We focused on using core muscles to keep the chair in momentum and alternating arms while bouncing the ball. I think I've found something new to practice, because I got my ass handed to me by someone who spends most of her time on her feet rather than in a wheelchair. I should have won.

I landed on my side laughing and barely noticed my skinned elbow. Sango and Miroku cleaned it, bandaged it and after their twins kissed it.

When we left their house, I felt an inner peace I hadn't felt before.

After Rin and I left the room, there was no judgment passed, no questions about what happened in the room, or apologies offered for the panic attack I had. I was welcomed back with open arms and encouraged to speak. When I said I didn't know what I wanted to do, they launched into a series of questions about what I was good at. Besides gardening…I never thought of what to do. For the first time, I admitted that I have been so closed off since my accident and losing use of my legs, I never thought of what I could do.

"What are you going to do now that you can land a triple again?"

She smiles broadly, making me smile with her. "Compete. There's usually a qualifying competition in the spring. I'm thinking about going, just to see what happens. No expectations of course, so I don't get disappointed."

"But you want to anyway and hope it will be similar to where it was before?"

"I can't land a quad and the amount of conditioning I'm going to have to go through. I love chocolate," she pouts as we pull up to my brother's home. "I need a coach too." She turns to me with wide eyes, "And I know just the person!"

"No."

"Oh come on!"

"No!"

"Please?" She sticks her bottom lip out and moves closer to me, tilting her mouth towards mine. "Don't make me beg."

"I know nothing about Figure skating, the scoring system, how to complete the jumps."

"No, but I do and Kaede can teach you. Come on! You know how to push someone and I'm sure you can learn the rest. Please?"

"Doesn't this violate some code?"

"Probably, but so does this." She presses her mouth into mine, breaking my resolve. Earlier while we dreamt, the picture was so clear to me, a family, children. Everything. I taste the roof of her mouth, the curves of her tongue. Her jaw is angular, strong but petite in my hands. "No promises."

"We go into it to have fun, not win medals. Thank you Sesshomaru."

"You've given me far more than I have you."

"I wouldn't be so sure. Come on, let's get this over with."

Kieran giggles while I wrangle him into his pajamas. We go back and forth between tickling and putting on his diaper, then his bottoms and a pajama top. I've survived an hour in the same room with my father with only a few insults being passed. Each time he said something, Rin squeezed my hand, reminding me that she was here and somehow it made them bite less than usual. It was the usual rhetoric, do you have a job yet? When are you going to college? The nonchalant, how is your mother that really means is she in rehab or jail. She's never been in jail but this is not her first bout in rehab. I have no hopes that it will take.

"You are too squirmy." Kieran needs to sleep. He's been over stimulated by grandparents on both sides, his Uncle and eaten too much sugar.

I put him on the twin bed in his room, despite the fact that he usually sleeps in the crib on the adjacent wall. "Which book tonight?"

He brings over a Little Critter Book, "Just Saving Money?" Probably a gift from our father. While reading to him, Inuyasha comes into the room and sits down on the bed next to us. He kisses his son and puts him in bed. "She isn't intimidated by him," Inuyasha tells me.

"Why would she be?" I interject between continue the story. "She isn't trying to impress him and I couldn't, even if I tried." And then, we bid Kieran goodnight and go to sleep.

"You okay?" I ask Rin as she lounges on the couch with her shoes off. The bandages I put on her feet earlier are off now. The side of one of her feet looks worse for the wear.

"Fine. Your sister-in-law convinced me to let your doctor in training brother look at my feet."

Inuyasha sits down in front of her with a first aid kit and begins cleaning the wounds. "Skating again?"

"Yeah," she answers with a smile. "I had a good coach this morning." She winks at me. We resolved to talk about training schedules later when the house is quieter and my father won't hear me daring to dabble my toes in another sport that he'll likely find as big of a waste of time as he did gymnastics.

"Skater?" Dad asks, making me flinch, because I know where this is going even before it's begun. He finds no value in sports.

"Yeah. I skated professionally until I was fifteen and had a bad fall. I broke my knee in three different places and retired right after."

"Then became a physical therapist?" he raises an eyebrow.

"Yep. Ouch…" she wiggles in discomfort.

"Try to sit still," Inuyasha encourages her, while he pokes a hole through the blood blister, draining what is inside.

"And now you're skating again?" Dad keeps going. "Why?"

"Because I like it and I missed it. Sesshomaru convinced me to try again and I'm glad he did."

He glances at me like I've made yet again another mistake. "Why would you do that, if you have a real career?"

Her eyes darken, but then she smiles. "You were never a professional athlete were you?"

"No," he stiffens and the room quiets. Suddenly, everyone is listening to this interaction.

"Because if you had been you would know that old habits die hard. I fell before I had a chance to make it to my first Olympics. I've missed the ice and it keeps me in shape. You look pretty fit, runner?"

"CrossFit," he replies. I keep a hand over my mouth, trying not to laugh.

"CrossFit, skating, running, jogging, one isn't really better than the other. The goal is to get your heart rate up to a therapeutic zone and exercise at least one hundred and fifty minutes a week. I'm a Doctor so technically it's my job to know this." Don't think I didn't notice the subtle dig there, how she's using her title that she so conveniently lets rest when we're together. In fact I've never seen her ask her patients to call her Dr. Matthews.

"You could learn something from her Sesshomaru. She has ambition." He stretches out in one of the Lazy Boy recliners.

Rin's face darkens further. I'm used to this. I have no ambition, no goals, no dreams and only would, if he approved of them. It's been like this for as long as I can remember. This time she's quiet. She sits next to me, taking my hand. "Isn't there some rule about dating your patients that you're breaking right now?"

"We're not dating," I interject quickly, removing my hand from hers. "We're friends and there's no rule against that."

"You know a patient's ambition is only as good as the support they receive from family right?" Rin pipes up, complete with a smirk on her face.

"Are you hinting at something?" My father glares at her.

A part of me wants to step between the two of them. Dad liked Kagura because of her ambition. He was convinced it was going to make me see the light and chase a more financially stable dream. But this could get interesting.

"I think we should go," Izayoi tugs on my father's arm, but he ignores her.

"Just that you seem to have high expectations of who he should be but no expectations about who you should be in his recovery."

"You—"

"I do this for a living. In fact I also spent a year training in rehab and six months myself in physical therapy when I broke my leg. The patients that healed the fastest were the ones that had the most support from family. When was the last time you checked in with Sesshomaru to see how he was doing?"

This time it's my father's face that darkens with lines around his eyes. He whips his hair over his shoulder and casts a frustrated glance at me, most likely because I am enjoying this interaction.

"Maybe you could come down to the office and we could talk about it, professionally of course," she lays him with a sidelong glance.

The entire time, for once, dear old dad is speechless. It's as if someone has reached into his mouth and clamped his tongue down, making it impossible for him to talk. Instead of answering, he gets up and gathers his coat and wife and bids the family good night. The entire time, Rin is smiling like a girl that just won a prize.

"Enjoying yourself?" I ask her, as my father closes the door.

"Yep." She flexes her newly bandaged feet. "Damn, this is gonna hurt when I skate in the morning."

"Pain is life," I tell her while she leans back on the couch.

"Thanks coach," she laughs, sitting up and tucking tender toes back under her knees.

"Maybe you should take tomorrow off," I offer, moving closer.

"Maybe. So listen about training. I wasn't really thinking about preparing seriously until after Christmas. I mean for now I can work on diet and getting leaner. Do you want me to pay you? That's half my hold up, Band of Seven said they would sponsor me, but I'm buried in student loan debt."

"And he's looking into nerve replacement therapy. By the way, I got you in. Your first appointment is in December, right before Christmas," Inuyasha joins us in the living room with a tray of coffees. "What's going on?"

Sharing a look that feels intimate and secretive, Rin and I divulge our plan. She will compete in the spring and I will coach her. "What about ethical codes?" Kagome sidles up next to Inuyasha.

"Yeah that's going to be a problem. I'm telling you, Suikotsu is just as good as me."

It almost hits me like a hammer that if I make this choice, that in the area I am most vulnerable Rin must pass the torch to someone else. I made more progress at first, because it was a simple crush but now, we've become something today and to think that Monday would come and I wouldn't get to be with her. "Maybe this isn't such a good idea."

"It's a perfect idea," Rin protests.

"I don't have a car."

"You'll learn to drive again, come on!"

The sudden patheticness of my situation hits me square in the shoulders, nearly knocking the wind out of me. I have no idea how I would even get to the rink in the mornings. I have no car, no means of even affording one and Inuyasha must be in school, leaving the car with Kagome, not to mention it would mean doing something I have avoided. "He's freaking out," Inuyasha says, breaking my thoughts.

"We can figure this out," Rin scoots forward and takes my hands. "Talk to me? Please? I want to try, but I need a coach I can afford. I'll even pay you. Ban said they would sponsor me if I wanted to try again. Whatever they give me, I'll give to you."

"Let me think about it." Avoidance is better. I've barely left my house or Inuyasha's in years and this would be put me in the spotlight again. How many coaches sit in a wheelchair on the sidelines?

I don't cry often and when I do, the tears are silent. When I woke up with a tube down my throat, unable to move my limbs, I waited until it was dark outside, until Inuyasha and Kagome had fallen asleep in the chairs next to my bed to let the tears drip out of the corners of my eyes. I was reduced to one wink for yes, two for no. To listening to explanations about my medical condition and having witnesses see that I consented to allowing my brother to make my choices for me, because I couldn't on my own.

My throat hurt, I wasn't allowed to drink. They pushed a tube up my nose to feed me and I was forced to watch myself changed like a child again. The entire time I wanted to yell at Inuyasha to get out, but he wouldn't. He held my hand, night and day.

The first time I felt my fingers again was two weeks later. Inuyasha fell asleep with my fingers molded to his forehead and woke up when I tested their range of motion against his skin. I could feel again.

It's the same now, I can feel.

In the confines of my bed, I consider Rin's offer. The topic changed to surgery, but just like this, there are barriers. Most of them are financial. Debasing myself in front of my father is foremost in my mind, next to selling the ring that I bought Kagura. I hold it in my hand, gazing at the shining gems, the elegant band and I'm taken back to that night we broke up.

She asked for one more chance to be by my side, to be what I needed. I had just returned home, to this house that I live in now. It was newly remodeled, filled with scents of freshly cut wood and varnish. She helped me up the ramp, something that's taken time for me to master on my own. It takes more upper body strength than you can imagine and I deconditioned during rehab from so much time on my back.

That night I came down with a stomach flu from ice-cream and cake, celebrating coming home. I threw up once, not able to make it to the toilet fast enough and then again and again. What started as just vomit turned into well, you can imagine. Now imagine not being able to run to the bathroom and having poor sphincter control.

Kagura was traumatized by it. She couldn't handle the mess. By three in the morning when I decided to sleep on the shower floor, she told me she was leaving. I lay on the cold towel for hours staring at the ceiling, ignoring the stench of the mess I'd made, only for my mother to find me.

Mother said nothing as she cleaned. She said nothing while she convinced me to get into bed and made a pallet on the floor in my room. And me, I ignored the sting in the corner of my eyes and tried to sound out Kagura's voice, "this is too much for me. I can't see you like this."

People tend to hold on to what's familiar because they are afraid to face the unknown. Coaching Rin in a sport that I'm not familiar with isn't what scares me, it's what's likely to happen between the two of us and how one day, she too will see me in my darkest hour and knowing better than to believe that she will stay with me.

I told Rin I would decide on Monday when I saw her again in therapy and we would discuss it after, preferably at a restaurant because I am starving after she is done with me. To which she told me she spends the afternoon at the rink and despite my protestation that she should take the day off she is going anyway and I could take that time to decide then.

"You're sure you want to do this?" Inuyasha asks me while he feeds Kieran lunch on Friday. He's home for once, relieving me of my duty as nanny.

"I need to do this," I reply, eating the rest of the turkey sandwich that Kagome prepared for me. "Why? Does my brother the doctor have some sage advice?"

"No. You do what you need to do. You know I'm always here for you. Are you going to see Dr. Hazan for the surgery?"

"Why not?"

"The consultation is two hundred dollars. I'll float you the money-"

"No, I'll cover it."

"Okay. It's in two weeks, December 8th."

Unlike Band of Seven that is closed Thursday and Friday for Thanksgiving, Kagura stays open during the holidays for the few patients that don't go on vacation. Her facility is located downtown rather than in one of the smaller suburbs. She services much of the same clientele and with the same professionalism. I watched her open this place. I felt like I had hit the jackpot because I was dating an older woman.

She leans over an elderly man who is learning to keep his balance with a cane. Her hair is tied in a loose pony-tail that spills over the side of her shoulders. She's still beautiful. Time has touched the lines beneath and to the side of her eyes, but her hands are the same coarse skin that used to run up and down my back when we made love and massaged my sore muscles after a difficult practice.

Kagura used to sneak me treats when she knew I shouldn't eat them. A latte with a brownie, an overly large cookie to split, milkshakes. Always with a sinister smile that I would burn the calories off doing flips around the horizontal bar. She actually did make me gain weight a few times and I was forced to pretend I had eaten her delicacies and then either purge myself of them or throw them out.

I don't check in. I act like I come here all the time. The place hasn't changed in the four years since I've been here. The secretary Jane is the same and so are several of her therapists.

Her eyes bolt open when she sees me. Her voice is firm in encouragement, not quite like Rin's, but gentle all at once. In fact, I recognize some of the same intonations that Rin uses on me. As soon as the woman is standing and then sitting in a chair, she motions over another therapist to continue and approaches me. Her mouth is slightly ajar, eyes timid. She's dressed in bright scrubs, the way I remember her from before, long beaded earrings that her grandmother gave her before she passed away. "Sesshomaru…"

"Kagura," I reply. My mouth is dry and my hands are clammy against the handles of my chair. I'm not sure I'm ready for this, if anything, I finally understand that anger has done nothing but hold me back.

"Um…what are you doing here?"

"I was hoping we could talk, privately."

"I'm busy now but I have a lunch break around twelve. Do you want to meet at Leven Deli? Twelve fifteen?" She's always been straightforward. It's one of the things I admired about her. When you're in the spotlight, people say what you want to hear, they fawn all over you, wanting to get into your good graces with compliments. Kagura was never like that.

"Sure," it comes out tensely.

"Hey…um…how are you?" She takes an awkward step forward, reminding me that I still can't look in her eyes without craning my neck.

"I'll see you in a bit," it's easier to say this than tell the truth that I've been in a mental rut since she left me. That I'm haunted by the love we had and the love I want with Rin. Dream, Rin had said. I've thought about that home on the beach, the dock to the sea green water. Swimming with our children, lazy days where we cuddle on the couch and a home with a ramp, where I don't have to be something I'm not.

It's cold, but despite that I take a table on the veranda of the restaurant. I'm not interested in keeping up appearances in front of others. I have enough to say that will likely leave me shaking. I order a scotch without ice from the server and water. I couldn't eat even if I wanted to right now.

As I'm sitting here, I notice two boys staring at me. I learned long ago to ignore it, but ignoring doesn't mean that I don't see it, or hear the whispers of parents telling them not to stare. The boys look like twins with dark chocolate skin and thick curly hair. One of them pushes his mom off when she tries to drag him away. "Momma stop. It's him."

"Who?" The mother peeks her head around the windows. She's a big woman, with the same thick curly hair.

"It's Sesshomaru Takahashi, can I talk to him?"

I nearly choke on my scotch. It's been at least two years since I have been recognized in public and longer than that since it was by a child. I'm drawn to the build of one of the boys, the way his chest and arms are thicker than that of his brother and he walks more gracefully.

"Who's Sesshomaru Takahashi?"

"The best gymnast ever. He went to three Olympic competitions before he got hurt. No one could beat him. Please momma?"

"Well as long as he doesn't mind."

"I don't mind," I tell the boy, leaning over my knees so I'm not quite so much taller than he is. "What's your name?"

"Jaliel, that's my brother Jackson. I'm ten, but I want to go to the Olympics too as soon as I'm old enough." He has a bright smile that lights up his eyes. "How'd you do it three times?"

"A lot of hard work. You have to want it more than anything else, sleep and eat well and listen to your coaches. Who's coaching you?"

"Selene Ballard. She said I could step it up and go with Jayden Wright, but we can't afford her." His face fills with disappointment.

"Jayden is still around?"

"You trained with her?"

"When I was your age. I'll tell you a secret, if you ask her, she'll find a way to make it work. My mother also couldn't afford it. If you are good enough, you can get sponsorship through some local businesses. You just have to show them you're serious." At ten, father refused to pay for my lessons. Mom cleaned the gym at night and some of the locally owned businesses paid me to wear their labels.

"How do I do that?"

"Win."

"I've won every competition this year!" he boasts proudly.

"Then you'll be just fine."

"Did it hurt?" he asks, circling my back. "When you fell?"

"Jaliel," his mother warns him.

"I didn't feel it when I fell. I did when I woke up in the hospital."

"Were you sad?"

"I'm sorry," his mother apologizes, but I hold a hand up. I'm actually enjoying this conversation despite the questions being asked.

"Very," I answer honestly. "Breaks are bound to happen. But what happened to me is very rare. I'll tell you another secret, always remember to eat. Your coaches, the better you get will want you to make weight, but don't pay attention to it. If you eat well, you'll be better off." His mother's face softens.

"Do you have scars from where they did surgery?" Jackson the other boy finally starts speaking.

"I'm embarrassed, I'm sorry," the mother tries to gather her children again.

"Do you want to see it?" Despite the cold, I shrug out of my coat and lean over, lifting up the back of my shirt. "You should see four scars. One is from the original surgery and three more for the ones after."

"Will you ever walk again?" Jaliel asks and a part of me isn't sure how to answer. I can feel his fingers tracing the lines on my back.

"Most likely not."

"So what do you do now?"

"I'm going to coach a Figure Skater, but I'll tell you something, if it works out, next year I'll coach you."

"You mean it?" He grins from ear to ear.

"I mean it." Taking out a pen and a napkin, I give his mother my cell phone number and explain to her that I've never coached and it wouldn't be right to take him now, but if I am successful with Rin, then in the fall or perhaps the following year, if he's still serious I will take Jaliel on. Even I do not believe what I am saying.

"Can I have a picture?" he asks, reaching for his mom's phone.

Nodding, I pose and smile genuinely. Once I was just like this boy. So full of life and hope. It's the hope I miss the most.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Kagura watching us. Jaliel's mother shoos them off just as Kagura approaches. "Since when did you get good with kids?"

"Since my brother became a father." Whatever warmth I felt before, radiating off myself has now iced over with her presence. She fidgets in her chair, twisting a ring on the tell-tale fourth finger. "Who is he?" I ask her.

"Someone I met at a conference. We're getting married this summer."

Breathing deeply, I force down the hurt, the twisting in my gut that makes me want to retch, that someone else could take my place in her life. "Can he walk?"

"Sesshomaru—"

"No," Holding up a hand, I keep going, "I've bottled this up for four years. Why? You knew I needed you, you do this for a living," I don't realize my voice is rising. "Not even your own protégé understands why you would let someone go because they broke their back."

Her face contorts. She takes water from the waitress and orders a soda. It seems she too cannot be brought to eat. "Protégé?"

"Forget about it and answer me." My hands are shaking. I hide them under the table to keep her from seeing them. Rin, is what I wanted to say. To tell her that her prized pupil who worshipped the ground she walked on is now my…I'm not sure what she is. More than a friend, not a lover yet, the woman I dream about, because every time we're together I feel like I can conquer the world one wheel at a time.

"I didn't know what to do—"

"The truth Kagura. You owe me that much."

She bites her lower lip and tears brim in the corners of her eyes. "I'm a coward. It's one thing to help patients through the worst part of their lives, the adjustment period, it's another to do with someone who was so capable before. You were so hurt and so angry, Sesshomaru you pushed me away."

"I did not—"

"Yes you did! You didn't want my help. You didn't want to do anything that could have minimized the damage you did to yourself!"

"Is that the doctor talking or the lover?"

"It's my profession."

"I was not a profession, I was your boyfriend! You didn't even come to the hospital in Rio. You didn't show up until I was in Rehab!"

"Look what do you want me to say? I couldn't do it. I couldn't watch you go through this and you didn't listen to anything I said!" She slams her fist against the table.

"I didn't want another doctor taking care of me! I wanted my girlfriend to…" It suddenly hits me what makes Rin and Kagura so different. Even in sessions, Rin has never made me feel like an invalid, like I had to listen to her or else. She comforts and pushes without making me feel like I'm failing, like I had a choice to not be in this chair. I wanted Kagura to hold me when the bouts of pain came, when I felt like I wanted to die and the darkness surrounded me like a blanket.

"I shouldn't have come." She buries her face in her hands. "Look…some people can handle the change in spouses, lovers, some can't and both reactions are normal."

"Is that what you told yourself. Did you ever stop and think what leaving me then would do?"

She shakes her head, the tears finally start spilling over her cheeks. "You were a wreck Sess."

"Sesshomaru. My name is Sesshomaru not Sess. I hated it when you called me that and yes. I. Was. A. Wreck. I broke my back Kagura. I lost my career, my financial independence, my ability to walk!"

"Look what do you want from me? An apology? I'm sorry. I can't do this." She gets up and leaves, leaving me to nurse the glass of scotch in my hand and attempt to calm the pounding in my heart.

In the top drawer, buried behind my boxers and socks is a small black box. The velvet cover hasn't been opened since Inuyasha cleaned out my hotel room in Rio. He knew. We had talked about ways to make the proposal meaningful.

He took Kagome to the beach in California and casually started carving letters out in the sand until she saw him writing, "Marry Me". Mother couldn't be trusted to keep a secret, so she was not in the loop. I ordered a 10ct diamond from Blue Nile that cost well over $25,000 dollars and has done nothing but been a painful reminder of what I lost.

$25,000 is more than enough to cover the cost of getting my own transportation and the necessary adaptive equipment and the co-pay for the specialist to see if I am even eligible for the surgery. It's time to let go. I have something better waiting for me.

**Please review!**


	17. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin continues getting ready for the competition that's a few months out and Sesshomaru makes his decision about coaching her.

**Rin**

"You're not getting high enough on the entrance to those jumps," Kaede tells me as I circle her again.

"I'm trying," I whine. My feet are killing me, making me think maybe I should have taken today off or finally buckle and spend a grand on custom boots, but I can't decide if there is a point to that, if I'm only going to compete in the qualifying competition and then go about.

"Try harder," Kaede encourages me. "It should be graceful. Did you start Ballet yet?"

"No."

"Did you find a coach?" Kaede watches me as I set up another jump.

"No. Sort of...maybe…"

"Well, which one is it?" she presses as I leap into the air, this time pushing harder into the ice and jumping higher, feeling it jar my legs and then land a triple salchow, nearly landing on my ass…again.

"I don't know. I asked Sesshomaru Takahashi." I slide up in front of her, wiggling my ankles in my boots. "He doesn't know anything about the scoring system and likely can't help me land anything but he knows competition and probably how to be graceful. I don't need a professional to make it to the qualifying rounds and I'm sure he can be a quick study."

"And you're blushing." She grins brightly and pats my shoulder. "If you're going to compete in May you need to hurry up. There's less time than you think." She's always on the rink in a fur parka and sipping on hot coffee or tea. She calls out instructions to two other skaters on the ice, encouraging them to make sure the last move connects to the next one.

Talent is only part of the equation when it comes to sports. The other half is hard work that racks up the bills quickly. Shippo agreed to help with choreography, Miroku said he and Sango would pay for the Ballet lessons if I needed it. Then there's the costumes, the rink time and at the end of the day it could cost a thousand dollars a week, more than I have to pay and a sit down at Band of Seven to see exactly how much they would be willing to cover. Not to mention, I still have living expenses and student loans.

"Ask your brother to DJ for me," Kaede tells me as I circle her, taking a break from jumping and turning to my spins. It's harder not to travel than it was when I was younger and my muscles aren't nearly as limber. "I'll trade Rink time for his services and add a bit for him."

"I'll ask him," I say just before leaping into the air, kicking my left up and landing on the right, spinning with one leg out. I haven't done a donut in forever and I swear every vertebrae in my back cracks while I do. I'm so out of shape.

"God I'm so sore." I lean over my legs, trying to catch my breath.

"Woohoo look at that ass! Honey it's like heaven is smiling on it!" I hear from the bleachers.

"It's closed skate Jak! What are you doing here?"

"Supporting my boo!" he cups his hands over his mouth to yell. "Get your ass up and show me that donkey spin!"

"Camel spin!"

"Whatever animal spin, bitch do it!"

"Tell your friend to watch her mouth," Kaede chastises me.

"Jak language!"

"I'm speaking English baby, get moving!"

Rolling my eyes, I pick up speed, circling the back wall and then throw myself into a sit spin to gain momentum and then lift my leg up behind me to spin like a camel. The position makes my back twinge, another area of limberness that I need to work on. I come out of it and bow to Jak who's clapping like a maniac. "That's my girl! You gonna bring a gold home?"

"No, I'm gonna compete for me and see what happens. What time is it?"

"Noon, you wanna hit Starbucks and get a latte?" Jak smiles and waves me over. He helps me out of my skates and through the cool down stretches. Sitting in front of him in the side splits, Jak pull my thighs wider apart. "Damn that burns."

"Honey we gotta loosen you up. From now on before you leave work, we're gonna do a massage and some stretches to remind these ligaments they're meant to stretch."

"Okay." I let him have his way with me and ignore the burn of him pushing and pulling on my back to get me loose. "How much are you guys willing to go in for?"

"Money tight?" He pushes on my back, forcing my trunk forward until my chest is nearly touching the floor.

"It will be if I do this. Ballet, Rink time," I pause and run my hand through my hair. "I asked Sesshomaru to coach me."

"Get out," Jak slaps my back playfully. "He was a gymnast not a skater though. You sure he can get you where you want to go?"

"I can still spot travelling a mile away Jak and," I sit up and lean to the side, letting him put pressure on my sides until it burns, "he knows ballet and I'm sure he can figure out how to get my scores up. I'm not paying for the big wigs yet. Maybe after."

"Maybe after she says." He helps me up and together we walk to the locker rooms. Jak follows me in like he owns the place, strutting, with a bigger swagger in his hips than mine. "We both know that if you place high, you're going to want to keep going. How's the knee holding up?"

"No pain. It's almost like I was never hurt. I feel like I'm missing something, taking something for granted. Like any day the pain is going to come back and remind me that I can't do this."

"Have faith baby." Jak pulls himself onto the counter and starts filing his nails while I get into the shower. "I think you'll go farther than we both think."

Monday comes and like clockwork I go to the rink and get my two hours in in the morning. I'm sore and tired before the day has even started. But this time Jak picks me up and takes me back to work and we get started on our day. It takes two cups of coffee to keep me on my feet, so I don't feel like passing out.

"I talked to Ban," Jakotsu tells me as we change the height on the parallel bars together for Adam, our new patient. He's 6' 5" and used to be a linebacker at UC until he got a bad concussion and suffered a minor brain hemorrhage. Now we're teaching him to walk again, while Renkotsu, our OT specialist is teaching him to hold a spoon and fork. It never ceases to amaze me that one wrong move and our bodies go haywire.

"And?"

"He wants to know what Takahashi thinks and then we'll decide." Jak smiles big. "Alright baby, get on the bars. Nice and easy."

"I ain't your baby," Adam snaps back.

"Well whatever you are, get out of that chair and stand for me. Get a nice grip on these bars."

Just as Adam is getting up, silver hair catches my attention. It's nowhere near three and this hair is too high up to be Sesshomaru's. "Oh my god." I nearly drop the kid I'm working with on an exercise ball.

"What?" Jakotsu looks around Adam's thick trunk and then deadpans me. "What the hell did you do to get that mother fu—"

"Jak!" Bankotsu calls from his office.

"Um…that man here?" Jak quickly corrects himself.

"Who's that?" Adam asks, following our gaze.

"One of my patients father. Um, Suikotsu can you take over with Kelly please?" Suikotsu takes the little girl who is learning to use her ab muscles and I approach Toga with a knot in my belly. I may have had some fun putting him in his place, but I never imagined he would actually come inside. "Hi," I reach a hand to his. "I didn't expect you to come."

"That makes two of us. Do you have a minute?" he speaks quickly and nervously. Something I've seen before. Drastic life changes can make even the most confident of parents question themselves.

"Yeah. Follow me." I motion him along through the equipment, behind the weights to the break room and close the door behind me. "What can I do for you."

He sits down, adjusting his tie, looking a bit worse for the wear. He closes his eyes and then opens them and then gazes at the cherry oak table. "I haven't slept since Thanksgiving thanks to you."

"I should probably apologize—"

"No, you shouldn't." He takes deep breath and heaves a sigh that's so telling, as it encompasses all the pain he's kept in over the years. "He was never an easy child, even as a boy. I thought, what's the point in doing a sport, even if he was one of the most gifted male gymnasts. I worried a day like what happened in Rio would come and because he was so focused on sports and not academics, he'd have nothing to fall back on. Sesshomaru never listened. We fought every time it came up."

I keep listening, letting him speak his truth. "I came to his competitions…many more than he is aware of. I watched him from the sidelines, so proud of him but too arrogant to tell him. But that day…everything changed. He changed. He was always arrogant, cunning and three steps ahead of me. He always knew exactly what to say to make it hurt, to cut me down to the bone. But after, he was so broken. I couldn't fix him," he breaks down covering his hands. "My boy, I couldn't make it better. I went to every surgeon, to every doctor in the United States and abroad and they said it was hopeless, that the surgeries he paid for wouldn't do anything to help."

He wipes his eyes as I slide a tissue across the table to him.

My mind sweeps through the records of the surgeries, all with the hopes of restoring some feeling or mobility. I wonder how much Sesshomaru has shared with him. "Do you know the results of the surgeries?"

"He never told me."

"Well," I say watching his reactions, how he tries to calm himself and how much pain he has held in. I pause and go back and forth in my mind, wondering how much I can tell him. The first surgery did what they hoped which was to give him back some measure of control over his bowels, while the next two surgeries did little more than provide false hope. "I can't tell you either without his permission. HIPPA, but it sounds like you've held in a lot of pain."

"I don't know how to help him," he says deflated and looks at me. "What do I do? Is it possible to even fix twenty eight years of hatred."

"Probably more so than you think." I smile and add, "I think deep down he just wants you to accept him for who and what he is and was. And remember his reactions are normal. No one and I mean no one can go through something so life changing and be okay. He's struggling and more than anything he needs his family by his side, to help him find the good in what is, not what can be, or what was. Even if he gets nerve replacement therapy—" Shit, I shouldn't have said that.

"What?" he balks, his eyes clearing and boring holes in me.

"Well…I shouldn't have said anything." I rub my temples, trying to figure out how to correct my error.

"Is it sound?"

"Sound enough," I reply. "Actually my ex worked on quite a few cases. It has a success rate in regaining upper body mobility and sensation and they're just wrapping up experimental cases at Denver Medical for lower extremity nerve replacement. It's possible as of what the total effect would be in his case I can't say."

"And your position in my son's life?" He raises an eyebrow and I bite my bottom lip.

"Maybe you should ask him."

"I want to hear it from you."

"Well, I'm interested."

"Even with his disability?"

"I honestly don't see it as a hinderance to a meaningful relationship."

"Neither did the last one."

"I know," I mutter and shake my head. I would love to get my hands on Kagura, but even she once told me, not every lover can tolerate the changes and it's not our jobs to change their minds. And as much as I yell at myself that Kagura's reaction was normal, I just can't get passed how badly she hurt him. "Look, I'm taking it one step at a time and I'll be very, very frank with you. I have a bad track record with men. I usually end up with assholes and I really do like your son and I wouldn't have started skating again if it wasn't for him and I asked him to coach me—"

"What? How can you drag him back into that life after what it did to him?" his voice starts raising.

I school my features in response and reply, "Mr. Takahashi, your son hasn't been excited about anything in four years. If he says yes to this, then what? He'll be doing exactly what you want him to do. He'll make an income off me and I'm not taking no for an answer on that and if he feels like he can do something, like he can succeed at something, even if I fail and suck and do nothing more than this one competition, for the first time in four years, Sesshomaru feels like he can instead of can't. Can, is such a powerful word. How can you deny him that?"

He doesn't answer. He leans back in his chair and lets out another tense breath.

"Do you ever wonder what would have happened if he would have known that you were there watching him the whole time? Or if you had been there in the hospital with him? You can't go back and fix that but you can fix now. Ask him what he needs to feel like he can accept the cards that he's been dealt. Believe in him."

"Believe in him?" he says soberly.

"All any kid wants is for their mommy and daddy to look at them and be proud. We lap it up just like we're little kids again."

"Do you love him?" He rests his chin on the bridge he's made out of his laced fingers.

"I care a lot for him. Probably something we're going to have to discuss with my boss if he goes through with this. But is it so hard to believe in him? To help him be strong and feel good about himself?"

He shakes his head and answers, "not this time. Thank you, Miss Matthews." He rises up and shakes my hand and then warmly cups it. "I see why he is smitten with you."

My cheeks heat, because damn if I'm not smitten with him too.

Just at three in the afternoon, the tiny golden bell sounds and in rolls in Sesshomaru. There's something different about him this time, as if a weight has been removed from his shoulders. It's a blustery day outside, making him remove several layers of clothing before he propels himself into the men's locker room. "You keep smiling like that everyone is going to know you're in love with him," Jakotsu tells me as he gets Danny set up on the parallel bars. The boy has been fitted for braces on his legs and is learning to manage walking with crutches.

"I'm not in love with him," I argue, but I'm not sure it's true.

"What did Daddy want?"

"I'll tell you later," I answer him, too aware of the eyes on us. I help Edith, my eighty year war veteran who took care of the injured in Vietnam onto the floor to try to regain some of her muscle strength. Suikotsu takes over once Sesshomaru rolls himself out and we start our routine. I help him get limber, bending backwards and forwards.

The entire time he's quiet. He slides out of his chair onto the floor and begins going through passive trunk exercises with little instruction from me. I watch as he uses a towel to lift his legs and rotate them himself and then rolls onto his stomach to do pushups and back onto his back to do sit ups. "Looking good, Takahashi," Jak cheers him on.

"Maybe he'll finally land it with Rin," Danny giggles. I cast them both a sidelong glance.

"Okay you two, mind your own business." I help Edith off the floor and onto one of the tables to give her a cool down massage. When I'm done with her, we start working on the bars again.

This time, Sesshomaru lifts himself effortlessly out of the chair and holds his weight up and then begins slides down and back up with perfect control. "Pshh," I sidle up in front of him. "How long today?"

"Ten minutes."

"That's a long time Takahashi. I should wrap your hands or you're going to get callouses."

"I already have callouses." He lands back in his chair and holds his hands up to show me what tattered skin looks like.

"We need to get you a good pair of gloves." I trace the callouses with my thumb and then pull out my timer. I'm anxious and excited, wondering what he has chosen for us. Is he going to agree to coach me, or continue to just live on the sidelines.

"I used to have something and then they ripped."

"And let me guess, you were too stubborn to replace them?"

"Too broke actually. Get the timer ready." He composes himself, schooling his features, memorizing the feel of the bars and lifts himself out with the grace of the athlete he is.

"Well just think, if you coach me, you'll start making some money."

"So it's out of pity you asked me?"

"No," I fumble the timer, nearly dropping it.

"Butter fingers. No wonder you chose skating."

"Hey," I want to slap his side, but restrain myself.

"But if I do coach you and you pay me, I'll lose my disability and SNAP."

"So then charge me enough to cover them both."

He walks on the bars, hand over hand and then grimaces into the third minute. "You know the problem with that is you are asking me to coach in a sport I am entirely unfamiliar with."

"You can't tell me you forgot the basics of creating a winning routine?"

"You mean how to make your score equal or top the ones in front of you. Which techniques to add in and which ones to take out? That I remember, but I'm a gymnast, not a figure skating."

"And I'm a figure skater without a coach. Come on, it'll be fun. Look you could easily charge me $100 an hour. It would be less than what I paid Kaede, but more than someone who just did it recreationally. Four hours a day, six days a—"

"Five."

"Six."

"Five, if I'm coaching you, you're taking days off to allow your body to rest and heal or you'll end up blowing out that knee again."

"Fine."

"Who says you can afford a hundred an hour?"

I shift my weight, glancing at the timer. We're seven minutes in and he's still standing strong. "I'll figure it out. My family will help me. Come on, please?"

"It also means I lose you as a physical therapist," he says more soberly.

"Suikotsu is just as good, probably better than I am. Look it's too late in the training game for me to find someone else and no one is going to want to take a chance on a has been who failed at the Olympics." Did I really just say that?

That's where he and are the same, and then diverge all altogether. He wanted it and got it three times. I'm the one who got there once and then biffed it in practice. I was so upset and so devastated but my family was there. They made it feel less like the world was ending and told me it was just another beginning.

"There are no endings Rin, just new beginnings," Miroku said when he sat with me in the hospital one night.

"What if it's not the beginning I want?"

"Life rarely gives us what we want, but what we need to bring the best out of us. This happened for a reason and I bet one day, you'll remember this conversation and know exactly why it had to happen. You're destined to change the world."

"You only say that because you're raising me."

"Because I mean it."

The words echo clearly through my mind as I watch Sesshomaru's arms begin to tremble from holding his weight. He struggles to keep himself upright and his breath becomes ragged. "You can do this Takahashi. One more minute."

"Sesshomaru," he whispers through clenched teeth. "My name is Sesshomaru."

"Don't give up on me, Sesshomaru."

"Never," he laughs, staring at the ceiling, trying to keep skinny, knobby legs from touching the ground.

"Thirty seconds. We're at the end."

"Not the end," he tells me, "just the beginning," he grunts out finally as the ten minute marker hits and the alarm goes off.

We sit shoulder to shoulder in Bankotsu's office, because weeks ago he had told me that if I wanted to try to compete again that he would sponsor me. It usually takes more than one sponsor to support a skater, but at this point I'll take what I can get. "So you are going to coach her?"

Sesshomaru nods.

"And you're going to skate in the qualifying rounds and that's it?" Bankotsu leans forward, resting his chin on his fingers. "Why not more?"

I open my mouth and then close it, hearing a rush of excuses cross my mind. Because I'm not that good, because it's been ten years since I competed and this is crazy, because I have a job. "I don't know if I'm good enough to do more than that."

Bankotsu tilts his head forward and then asks, "and how much do you want to coach?"

Sesshomaru is adorable when he thinks. His lids close and then open and then he looks at me with a soft smile that sends shivers up my spine. "I believe the average is a hundred dollars an hour."

"What other costs are involved?" Bankotsu asks.

"There's rink time, choreography but my brother will help with that. Shippo was also a world-class figure skater for many years. But I don't want to quit my job here. I also have a life I have to pay for, student loans and housing and groceries and I can't ask my brother in law and sister to—"

"Rin," Bankotsu cuts me off. "At the moment I'm willing to give you $2,000 a month. Enough to cover the cost of your coach and the extra for rink time and whatever else you need. You'll see a separate paycheck on the first of the month and be responsible for paying him. Should you decide to take it further, I'd be willing pitch in more than that."

I think I just swallowed a rabbit because my stomach is flipping and doing somersaults. A part of me wanted him to say no so that I didn't have to do this. I'm not all confidence all the time. I know the strain this is going to put on my body and likely on my non-existent relationship with Sesshomaru. Deep down, I know I can do this and maybe even be good at it.

"And finally, you two can no longer work together," he says sternly. "Do you have a preference of who you would rather work with?"

"Suikotsu," he says quietly and then adds, "Also, I need an OT appointment." He glances at me and then back at Bankotsu, shifting uncomfortable in his wheel chair. "I would like to buy a car. I need to know what adaptations I need."

A slow and steady smile spreads on Bankotsu's face while he opens up the schedule and they find a time for the evaluation. I can't help but smile either. He's changed so much and he's becoming so much more independent. "Anything else?" Bankotsu asks.

"No, I think we're good," I answer.

"Very good," Sesshomaru grins at me as we leave. "Very good indeed."


	18. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru takes control of his life and starts living the way he wants to. He sees the surgeon for nerve transfer therapy and his father makes an even bigger gesture of support.

**Sesshomaru**

It's night by the time we leave Band of Seven in Jakotsu's car. It feels entirely too odd being in the car with the man who comments on the roundness of my ass cheeks and the specific shape and what he thinks it means about my personality.

I'm pulled out of my thoughts by Rin's fingers threading between mine. She's smiling at me, with one leg crossed over the other, reminding me that I have something to look forward to, not just helping her achieve her goal but now that I am no longer allowed to work with her, it's possible I can see more of her. Be something more to her.

Over the weekend I took the diamond ring I bought for Kagura to the jeweler. It turns out, diamonds do not retain their value and depreciate overtime. My saving grace is that I had a warranty with the company I purchased it at and was able to get $15,000 for it. Not quite what I was hoping to make a dent in the ephemeral bucket but enough to look into the process of regaining my license.

For the record, mine has been expired for several years and once you suffer a spinal injury you don't just automatically get to keep your license. Under Colorado State Law's I must be evaluated by an Occupational Therapist and undergo therapeutic driving lessons and be deemed safe to be on the road again.

When I was in rehab, I did try to drive again. There's a push pull system used for people like me who have ample use of their upper body. However, in rehab, the swelling was still going down, which meant that I was regaining the use of my arms. The impact of my tail bone shot up my arms into my neck. As the swelling went down, the ability to control my core returned.

I was too eaten by depression in rehab to learn to drive. Now I must go to the doctor first to have a form filled out stating that I am not a menace to society or the roads and another filled out by Band of Seven stating that I am enrolling in their driving program. From what I can tell, it will take four to twelve hours of instruction, after a four hour evaluation. None of which is covered by insurance, which means that although my goal is to drive again I may not have enough funds to purchase a car, much less cover the cost of this surgery.

I start rubbing my forehead, feeling tired and overwhelmed.

"What are you thinking about?" Rin asks me.

"I have a lot to do."

"You're really going to drive again?"

I nod.

"Did you get set up with Ren?" Jak says from the driver's seat.

Casting a scowl at Jakotsu, I answer, "yes. Before I left."

"He's a good teacher," Rin tells me. "But you have to have your own car to be able to learn. They want you to learn on what you'll be driving."

Suddenly the roof of the car is very fascinating. Jakotsu has a plethora of pins hanging from the roof of his car. Some are from anime, other are Star Wars and Star Trekked themed. Nothing is ever easy when you crippled, why would this be any different?

"You're going to do great," Rin giggles and leans against my shoulder. "Kaede said she'd give you the run-down of the different moves and then we just have to see where the top scorers are and start putting together a routine. Shippo can help with the choreography."

"Don't expect me to take it easy on you just because we're friends," I warn her.

"I don't. That's why I asked you."

I've been sitting with Kaede for two hours now. In that time I've learned that, each jump is identified by the approach and blade work before the leap and how to count rotations. A toe loop starts on the outside edge on both the entrance and the exit, with the toe pick adding the height. Rin lands a single and then a double and gets nervous when I ask her to push herself and land a triple. The base value is 4.3 points. "It's the fall," Kaede tells me. "She's still nervous about blowing that knee out."

"What's wrong with his legs?" a child skater nearby asks me.

"Quiet Kelly, go back to your spins. Sit and then camel. Four times until you stop traveling. Not like that. Your arms need to come in naturally."

I hold back my laughter. Kelly looks to be around twelve years old. The perfect age to feel like you are on top of the world and injuries heal faster than a child growing a new tooth.

"Now watch Charlie. He's fourteen and set to go on the Grand Prix this year. Rin could too, if she gets over her nerves. Outside edge Rin!"

Rin stumbles and catches herself.

"This is a loop, no toe. See how he goes up using the outside edge of both skates and then lands on the outside edge of his skate? The base value is 5.1. The values are important. The majority of your points are earned from jumps. Hug yourself tighter Charlie!"

Then she shows me the salchow, with a base of 4.1. It starts on the inside edges and ends on the outside. When we get to the axel, which is the only jump starting facing forward and landing backwards, requiring an extra rotation and faster spinning. She points out how the jump begins on the outside edge and lands on the outside edge. I avoid telling her that Rin has already landed a triple axel but the question is if she can do it reliably enough to get the points necessary to win.

By the end of the two hours Rin is limping of the ice and wincing in pain. "Dare I ask how to get her feet to stop hurting?"

"Custom boots," Kaede tells me. "I'll send you some links to study for the spins and to understand the scoring system." My wheels slip along the ice as I push myself off the rink. "They boots are around a thousand dollars."

I blow air through my lips. Any athlete has to spend a fortune on coaches, gym time and extra lessons. "She survived off of sponsorships before, but her medical bills ate through her savings and her family has never been well off," Kaede explains to me. "She's buried in student loan debt now. She doesn't have the money but if she wants to skate a clean and comfortable program, she needs to get them and break them already. Time is of the essence."

Rin is surrounded by her family by the time I get to her. Shippo has one of the twins and Kohaku the other one. "Family party?" I ask her.

"It's family food night. We're lame and it's never the same night, but it's our thing," she tells me, pulling her skates off. She has fresh bruises and cuts on her toes.

"You need custom boots." I flick her toe, making her groan in pain.

"I know," she whines.

"Your feet look terrible," Shippo says.

"They never looked like that when you competed before," Sango says, taking off the bandages and massaging Rin's feet. "How much do they go for again?"

"A grand," Rin answers timidly.

"Do you have it?" Miroku inquires and instead of feeling pride in watching her family circle around her, I feel a twinge of jealousy that my own family wouldn't do the same thing. By my count I need around seventy thousand dollars to pay for surgery, the car, rehabilitative driving lessons, not to mention the small fortune in Uber to get to and from the DMV.

Inuyasha knows I am coaching Rin, but I've said nothing to my father or my mother. The first month is spent in near isolation and I already know not to expect her phone call for another few weeks.

"Not really," she says quietly. "I mean I have some money in savings, I could probably part with a few hundred."

Miroku reaches into his back pocket and pulls out his wallet, flipping through several bills. "Here's four hundred. Sango do you have anything?"

"It's the grocery money." She flips through her purse and takes out another hundred.

"I've got a hundred," Shippo gives Miroku Keaton and takes out several hundreds.

Kohaku follows suit. "I've got two hundred to spare. That's eight hundred, is that enough not to break you?"

"That leaves about two hundred for me. I should be able to get something. It takes about six weeks for them to come, so I'll have to deal with these until then. And start ballet and Shippo we need to come up with a routine."

"Can you adapt one of your old routines?" I ask Rin.

"I think so. I have a few I should be able to modify. I'm not sure I can do the same intensity yet. I can send you some of the routines and then you and Shippo can talk about modifying them and I'll be at your command."

"Oh Rin, the guys are coming over for movie night in two weeks—" Kohaku starts.

"No, Kohaku, not again," she starts putting her socks and shoes on. It only occurs to me now that I feel like an outsider while she is surrounded by family.

"Why not?" Sango asks her.

"Because Rhino has a crush on me and hits on me every single time he comes over," Rin gags herself.

"Hey, he's my friend," Kohaku kicks her ankle.

"No damaging the goods," I warn jokingly and move closer to Rin. "I'll see you in the morning."

"How are you getting here?"

"I'll manage."

We fall into a routine over the next two weeks. I meet her at the rink at six in the morning, most days yawning and chugging coffee to keep myself awake and stay with her until Jakotsu picks her up at eight. I ride with them and get off at Inuyasha's.

Immediately I fall asleep, because believe me, I'm not used to dragging myself out of bed so early. Kieran protests my naps and at least twice I've woken up with peanut butter in my hair. At this rate, I'm going to have to cut it to keep his chubby fingers out.

During that time I manage to get the doctor to fill out the form that express my "medical change" and how it affects my driving. We go back and forth about whether or not I need more restrictions until I remind my PCP that OT will handle that.

Ren and I spend four hours together on a Thursday morning going over the driver's evaluation. He had warned me ahead of time it could take a while. It involves testing my reflexes, sight, perception, ability to pay attention to the road and then we discuss adaptations and how I will drive the most comfortably. Which lead to an appointment at the DMV where I sat in line for two hours, literally, get the joke? It barely moved and I thought I was going to fall asleep before I delivered the appropriate papers and received a permit.

Say what you want about that, my fingers buzzed with electricity touching the colorful corners of the plastic. With this I will earn my freedom and independence. If the neuropathic pain that's beginning to flare doesn't kill me first.

In between all this I began making time to apprentice under Kaede. She was all too excited to show me the ropes of figure skating and after hours staring at the computer until my eyes were red, I've learned to spot the jumps from across the rink. I know that spins must be graceful or the skater will travel and lose points. Each motion as their arms rise must be done delicately, their legs tightening in slowly to control the rate of spin. In another life, it's possible I would have done well at this sport too.

I've discovered 230 is the highest number a female has received competing and that if Rin wants to take her program further than qualifying rounds she would need to score at least over two hundred to make it to sectionals, which after comes regionals and then the grand prix tournaments and Worlds. Her prior programs ranked higher in the 230's but she was also one of the first female skaters to attempt and land quads in competition.

I rake my hands through my hair as I watch her programs from when she was fourteen and fifteen, trying to decide which one would suit our purpose best. The Olympic program is too advanced and the scores too low before she transitioned from Junior to senior.

Googling other routines, I find one just after she levelled up and examine the elements and points. She still threw a quad but we can easily make up the points by tossing my jumps in at the end of the program and banking on the lopsided rule that jumps get more points after the first half of the program.

It's December 8th. A day I have both been looking forward to and dreading. I'm missing physical therapy today to see Dr. Hazan in the hopes of attaining a surgery I can't afford by any stretch of the imagination. Sending the link to Shippo to figure out how we can adapt this program to her current skill set, I shut the computer down and check on Kieran. He's still sleeping soundly.

Leaving his room, I knock on Kagome's door. "Come in." She has her nose buried in a book and looks worse for the wear. "You leaving?"

"Yes. I'll be at the rink after."

"Should I pack you dinner?"

"No. I'll pick something up on the way there." I never was good at settling my nerves until after my routines were completed. If only now I had a bar to flip over.

Rin's called me three times in between her patients today. On the fourth call, I start laughing, "Why are you calling me again?"

"Just seeing how it's going. If you're answering, you're either done or still waiting."

"Still waiting." I'm on time, the doctor is two hours late. If I wasn't so busy learning a new sport I might have lost my temper by now. But this is normal, once I had to wait six hours to see an endocrinologist. I am keeping myself entertained by taking notes and developing a routine.

"Just think, this and your Driver's lessons and you'll be gold. But I bet your used to that."

"Very cheeky. Just for that I'll work you extra hard tonight."

"Actually, um about tonight, will you come to my place? My brother is having some friends over and Rhino has been after me for years now. Please?"

"As you wish." I flex my arms that have been bothering me for days. The pain is coming, but with any luck, not tonight.

The door opens and the nurse calls my name. "I have to go." Nerves take me suddenly. I sold myself on dreams before. One more surgery and I would walk. One more and I would at least be able to feel my toes and this…I already feel like I'm wasting my time.

"Sesshomaru." I must be dreaming, because I know that voice and never in four years has my father ever come to an appointment. I didn't even tell him about this, which means that my brother must have spilled.

I stop just by the door, dumbfounded, unable to speak.

"Inuyasha said you'd be here. I'd…um…I'll just wait out here," he says, shifting nervously and then finding a chair.

"Are you ready?"

"A minute," I say and move to my father. "Why are you here?"

"I thought you shouldn't be alone," he says so quietly I almost miss it. "I'm sorry son," he whispers.

My ears must be broken, or my injury has spread to my auditory system. My father never apologizes ever. Not even the time he thought teaching me a man's sport was a good idea and threw a football into my nose, breaking it. My face was swelled for weeks and I missed two competitions.

Words are caught in my throat. Leaving him, I turn around and go into the office, oddly comforted by his presence.

The doctor is a fit man, not too tall with sun-hardened skin. He enters with a computer. He has a slight accent. "So…you are Sesshomaru Takahashi. I read about your case before this."

Because of who I was, most doctors have.

"You suffered a fracture in L2 and have no sensation below the waist. You've already undergone three nerve repair surgeries, the last one was unsuccessful?"

I nod. There isn't much else to say about it. The hope was that it might restore some sensation below the waist but it didn't. I also spent the of my savings on it, but to no avail.

"When was your last EMG?" He adjusts his glasses.

Electromyographic testing involves using electric currents to test the extent of nerve damage. "February."

"And you've had no improvements since then?"

"Only improvements in the parts of the body I already have sensation. I still can't feel anything."

We talk about the basics of my health, how the injury happened. The room quiets as I explain in earnest for the first time to a medical professional how I fell in the first place. That the pressure and strain of making weight made me eat less than I should have and I fainted during the dismount, landing on my back, a mistake that I have paid for, for years.

Dr. Hazan's face sobers and he nods. "Sometimes there's too much strain on athletes. Do you still suffer from anorexia?"

"No. I dealt with it during rehab. It was rooted in competition, something I haven't dealt with sense then."

"Good. Can you get on the table. I'd like to examine your range of sensation."

Sometimes, there's nothing like a good prick. He pokes my stomach with the end of a pen asking me to tell him when I no longer feel it dig into my skin. He tests the reflexes in my feet and comments on my lack of muscle tone and deconditioning. Swallowing my pride has never been something I do easily, but this time I do.

It doesn't come easily, explaining that I have squandered the last four years before Autumn when Rin began working with me. "There will be a regimen if you're approved for the surgery. If you don't follow it, your chances of recovery will decrease exponentially."

"I understand," I purse my lips and continue, "I plan on following through."

In the end, he tells me my chances at recovery are around sixty percent, which aren't perfect odds, but it's very possible. I'll need to undergo further testing to determine which nerves were damaged and if it's possible to replace or repair them. This will also determine how invasive the surgery is and how long the recovery will be. "There's hope, Sesshomaru," he says brightly, "we've cared for worse and seen improvements. I look forward to working with you."

There's hope…

Exhaling, I leave the office, feeling lighter than I have in the past. There is hope, even if it's a small.

My father still waiting for me outside the office. He motions down the hall and asks me, "Did you eat dinner yet?"

"Not yet," I reply. I'm already feeling the effects of missing the filling dinners Kagome makes for me. Glancing at a wall clock, I note the time. I need to be across town in an hour. "I have to work in an hour," I say proudly, because for the last two weeks I've made eight hundred dollars myself, rather than living off disability.

"I know," he speaks more softly than he has in the past. We go in the elevator together. I'm still unsure why he is here, when he's never been in the past. "How'd it go?"

"You really want to know?"

"Yes." His face contorts in pain, as if I've caused yet another wound. "Yes."

I hand him the informational papers about the surgery. They include the chances of recovery and the healing process. I've learned to not wait for affirmation, but for the imminent reprimand. When it doesn't come, the air become thick with unspoken words. "It seems sound enough."

"Excuse me?"

"Sesshomaru I didn't come here to fight."

"Then why did you come? Because we both know that you've offered nothing but anger and rejection since I was a child!" I can barely get the words out without gnashing my teeth. I snatch the papers out of his hand and start propelling myself out of the hospital at top speed.

He jogs to keep up with me. "Will you wait."

"Why should I?"

"Because I'm giving you back your trust fund."

I slam the breaks on, nearly knocking into my father in the process. "What?"

His face softens, sobering and smoothing lines of frustration. "I'm giving you back your trust fund. There's around $900,000 inside. Do what you want with it. You can talk to Jaken about taking money out. I'm only adding the restriction that you can't take out more than $4,000 a month."

My mouth is dry. I'm unsure if I'm dreaming or not. $4,000 is more than enough to cover my expenses and then some. "And I'll…I'll cover the cost of the surgery," he says as he reaches the financial agreement.

I start coughing to contain the emotions welling in my belly. It's hot and cold all at once. I dreamed of this day, but never expected it to come and now that it has, I'm not sure how to respond to him. "I'm sorry, son," he says again. "I didn't understand you. I didn't even try."

He' waiting for me to say something, but I can't. The years have been too unkind.

"I…," he glances down at ground, staring at his fancy designer label shoes. "Do you need anything?"

"No," I answer quickly, "I'm fine."

"You're sure?"

I take a deep cleansing breath, trying to force myself to recognize the gesture, that he's done more for me than he has in the past, but pain runs deep. "I'm fine. I have my brother and a friend and mom."

"How is she?" He takes another nervous step towards me.

Wincing, I wheel myself backwards, gazing up at him, feeling a slight tinge of pain in my neck. If he had been around me more, he would know to kneel down, or sit in one of the nearing chairs so I don't get a crick in my neck. Pain radiates down my spine, reminding me that my body is rebelling again. Soon, I'll fall victim to a bout of neuropathic pain that reminds me my legs exist, even though I can't feel them, but I can feel the pain.

"She's in rehab. She left two weeks ago. I'm going to be late," I remind him that I have somewhere else to go and start wheeling away.

"Sesshomaru," he chases after me. "I really am sorry."

"I know," I say. "We'll talk another time. Thank you," is all I can offer him, because it's been too long.

"You flutzed!" I tell Rin after she lands a double lutz on the inside edge of her blade instead of the outside. "Do it again."

"I never should have taught you that phrase," she shoots back at me and sets the jump up again.

"Enough talk, show me you can land the double clean," I press her, rolling closer so I can see her foot work better.

Her face hardens and a flash of pain shoots across her eyes.

"You didn't ask me to help you to baby you Rin, do it!"

Her eyes roll. She starts the jump, beginning on the inside edge of her blades and then landing on the outside edge, clean and beautiful. "Perfect."

Instead of coming back to me, she skates off the ice and storms towards the locker-room. If I weren't in so much pain, I would chase after. I'm drawn to the ice and how it chills the air around me. Locking my breaks, I slide out of my chair onto the ice. Before laying down, I peel off my jacket, revealing a maroon button down top.

It's so cold and soothing. The pain is beginning to spread to my fingers, making gripping the handles of my wheels painful. Usually mom is with me when this happens.

While Rin is blowing off steam, I think of how I am going to handle this on my own. Most of the time I can't, which is why I chose to live with my mother. Closing my eyes, I take deep breaths, attempting to will the pain from my back where it's the worse. "You okay?" I see Rin leaning over me when my eyes open.

"Peachy. Go jump again."

"While you lay on the ice?"

"I have a better view this way," I pinch the skin inside her thigh, making her nearly lose balance and fall. "Are you alright?"

"Frustrated. My feet hurt in these damn boots and it's going to take at least four weeks to get the new ones. I didn't like how you were talking to me."

"Again, you didn't ask me to help you to go easy on you. Treating you with favor isn't going to take you where you want. On the ice I'm your coach, off the ice I'll be your friend."

"Friend?" she asks, straddling my stomach.

"Get off," I push her sideways before her bottom can touch my stomach, knowing that again, I've hurt her feelings. "I'm sorry. My back hurts," I say quickly, hoping to assuage the pain in her eyes.

She nods, biting her lower lip. "Neuropathic? How bad is it?"

"Bad enough to lay down on ice."

She sits down cross legged next to me. "Maybe we should both just call it a night. Shippo is going to pick me up. Do you want a ride home?"

"I'll be fine."

"Says the guy laying down on the ice," she reminds me. "You're not fine."

"No," I answer, staring at the bright lights on the ceiling until my eyes begin to burn from the shine. Glancing at my watch, we have another hour to go and I don't want it to go to waste. "Lutz, axel and then toe-loop and then spins and foot work. We can call it a night after that."

She nods.

I stay on the ice, letting it cool my angry burning muscles while she lands the doubles I've asked her to. "Try a triple." I instruct her, not caring which one. Her confidence was blown when she broke her knee. That and stamina are what we are trying to build. "Now spins." Right now we're working on techniques. Much like a pianist that hasn't picked up their instrument in years. She's remembering the notes, the way the ice feels beneath her blades and the inherent strength in her body.

After the last sit spin she skates over to me and kneels down. "Need help getting up?"

"I can't just sleep here tonight?" I know as soon as I move, my body will begin flaming in pain. It's not something I'm looking forward to.

"Nope," she helps me sit up. The motion sends fire up my back into my arms, legs and fingers. "On three." She digs her toe pick in for leverage and together we haul me off the ice and into my chair. I don't fight her when she takes the handles and pushes me across the ice. "Actually, well it was supposed to be movie night. Hak was having his bandmates over but do you want to go to Sango and Miroku's place? They have this awesome jet-stream bathtub. Mom had it put into the house when Sango and I were competing for the sore muscles. I bet it'll help and then you can spend the night if you want."

I raise an eyebrow at her, leaning against the back of the chair. "Just like that huh?"

"Like what?" She starts her cool down routine, stretching to make sure her body stays limber.

"What is this between us? We both know there's more between us than just friendship." We haven't gone out together since I began coaching her but every other day she hands me something for dinner. We flirt relentlessly at the Band of Seven and at times, instead of cooling down, I find her straddling my lap and making me wish I felt more below my waistline.

"Just come over tonight? Please? If it's as bad as I've read in your file, we both know you shouldn't be alone." She picks up my hand, a motion that burns, and kisses his my fingers. "I really care about you, let me take care of you tonight. You don't have to be alone."

In place of the pain, there's a warmth in my chest, that bubbles up into my throat making me smile but reality hits me square in the chest. There's more to my pain than just keeping me company.

The first time it happened was in the hospital months after the injury. At first, it gave me hope. My toes were burning, like someone was holding them over a bonfire. I was overjoyed to be feeling something below my waistline. I thought it meant sensation was coming back. But instead, it spread up my calves, into my hips and back and then encompassed my whole body. I thought I was dying, that someone was burning me alive.

They gave me so many pain killers I couldn't see up from down. I spent days in pain. The doctors told me it was neuropathic. My brain was miscommunicating with the damaged nerve endings, sending the wrong messages and there wasn't much they could do for it. Physical therapy helps, because it reduces the fluid buildup and increases blood flow. Rest and avoiding certain foods but in general there's nothing to do but take a pain killer and wait for it to stop. For some, the pain is constant.

When it happened, mom was in another bender. She came into the hospital completely tossed but somehow managed to shake enough of it off to help with the catheter, to demand that I get an epidural to kill the pain in my legs and when it became blinding, it was her embrace that I hid in.

"Come on," Rin tells me, packing her things away. "I'll take a shower at Miroku and Sango's. Let's go. I texted Shippo, he'll be here in twenty minutes."

"Rin," I grab her hand. "It's not going to be a walk in the park. This is just the beginning. It gets worse."

She kneels down in front of me and cups my face with both hands. "It's not going to scare me away."

But that's exactly what I'm afraid of.

We stopped at Inuyasha's on the way home. He knew just by looking at me that I was entering another flare up. He offered to have me stay at his home, but a jet bath was much more enticing. By the time we got there, I could barely get back in the car on my own. Rin and Shippo both had to help me.

I rested my head in her lap, breathing fitfully during the drive to Miroku and Sango's. They were all too happy to host me for the night. Rin ran her fingers through my hair, reminding me that I wouldn't have to be alone this time.

When we arrived, it took both of them to get me out of the car. My muscles gave out. I couldn't lift myself. I let her wheel me into the house and then to the stairs on the second floor. She and Miroku helped me up, because my body was too exhausted.

Now I'm watching as she fills the tub. "How hot do you want it?"

"Huh?"

"How hot? The water?"

"Hot enough," I reply, barely able to hear through the blood rushing in my ears.

"Don't you have something you could take?"

"Vicodin."

She rummages through my pill bag until she finds it and takes one out. "Come on, take it."

"I hate how it makes me feel," I respond. It's like I lose myself.

"So do a lot of people. But it will help." She hands me a bottle of water to swallow it with.

It's already passed five o'clock, making me stare forlornly at the toilet. "Would you mind stepping out for a bit?"

"Sure." She leans over and kisses my cheek. "It's okay you know. It really is. I'm not going to be thrown off by anything you have to do to take care of yourself."

"Digital removal?" I challenge her.

"Saw it in rehab. Taught people how to do it in rehab. I could even help you."

"And it didn't bother you?"

"Okay at first bodily fluids did bother me. But," she says with a smile, "I got used to it. Just tell me what you need. Tonight I'm yours."

I relent and move closer to the toilet. It's when I move to the buttons of my pants that I keep fumbling them because of the pain in my fingers. It's like trying to maneuver sausages rather than slender appendages. "Do you mind?" I can't finish, at this point I'll have no pride left in this relationship.

She sits on the edge of the bath and looses my belt and then pulls the zipper down and helps me push them around my ankles. "You're too worried about scaring me off."

Taking me under the arm, she pulls me onto the toilet. I lean over my knees and am surprised when I feel hands on my back, slowly running warm water over my skin. It's so soothing, I forget the embarrassment I feel having her in the bathroom with me. She reaches around my front and starts pulling at the buttons on my shirt and slides it off my arms and then takes off my undershirt until I'm completely exposed. "Still want me to leave?"

"You can stay," I say, doing what I need to do. At least this part I don't need help with.

The tub finishes filling. She shuts the water off and continues rubbing my back in soothing motions. I can feel the Vicodin starting to kick in. It's like being drunk but more aware. "I hate this." I rub my eyes, trying to clear my vision. "At this rate I'll fall asleep in the tub."

"It's alright, Sesshomaru." She stands up in front of me and starts removing her clothing. I think I'm hallucinating when the undershirt comes off, revealing a black sports bra and then she tosses her leggings off, her thong…she wears a thong?

I wait with baited breath for the sports bra to reveal what's beneath. "God you're beautiful."

She laughs and pulls me onto the edge of the tub. "What are you doing?"

"Getting in with you. I'll keep your head above the water. Come on." She helps me in and then slides in next to me. My head lulls against her neck, smelling the sweat and soap of her skin.

"You smell good," I whisper, afraid to speak louder for fear that this moment will end. My hands glide down her sides and then back up, exploring her back and stomach.

Her breath shivers against my head. I rest against her, feeling heavy and exhausted and eaten by the pain. It's a combination of dizzy and lucid. My eyes open and close, until things get dark and I lose myself to the pain.

The next time I open my eyes, we're in the guest bedroom down stairs. Somehow I'm dressed in clean boxers and a black tank top. The pain is less but still persistent enough moving hurts. Rin is reading a book with a small light on, also dressed in pajamas. "Hey," she mutters and sets the book down. Her lips touch mine, I open for her, kissing them tenderly and then pull her closer. "How are you feeling?"

Shrugging, I choose not to answer. I still feel like I was hit by a truck.

"Hungry?"

"I can't eat when I feel like this."

"Something easy on the stomach? A smoothie? Hot soup? You need to eat something."

"Nothing."

She turns the light off and moves closer to me. "Is it okay if I sleep here tonight? I wanted to make sure you had what you needed. I cathed you in your sleep."

"What?"

She sniggers. "You said you needed the bathroom but couldn't make it yourself."

Growling out frustration with myself, I kiss her forehead. "You can sleep here. You just wanted to touch me."

"Maybe. You're so warm."

"Are you cold?" I pull the blanket over her shoulders.

"A little. Can I ask you something?" I feel a hand slide up my shirt and rest on my side, making me take a sharp breath in. "Um…do you know where your erogenous zones are?"

"I'm in pain." Now I know where her mind is.

"I mean not now, but…you said sometimes it's hard you know, but you always seem to have no issues when I massage-Oh my gosh!" she giggles. I feel a firm hand running the length of my side, and in the stupor of Vicodin and with a warm female body next to mine, I start panting. "I knew it!"

I groan into her ear. "I think that's one of them."

She reaches behind me and turns the lamp on. "It could distract you." She lays a thick kiss on my lips, enough to rouse my senses more.

I never looked for them before. One of my many concerns after the injury was whether or not I would be able to perform. At first an erection was farthest from my mind, until the swelling and pain diminished and because the one person I wanted next to me the most wasn't there. I had hoped that Kagura would come around and together we would find the places on my body where that would become more sensitive but that never happened.

Now with Rin, the offer is appetizing, despite the pain. "Are you tired?" she says dejected.

"Yes," I answer but thread my fingers through her hair, pulling her lips back to mine. "You can look."

"I don't want you to do something you're not comfortable with. We can wait."

"Rin," I pause, trying to think of what to say. The doctors had said that this would be something I'd have to relearn and that other areas would become more sensitive in place of my penis. I can't feel it. I tried masturbating and although I can reach arousal, I rarely climax. In essence, I've never done this before and feel like I'm on a maiden voyage.

"Tell me," she mutters against my lips, brushing hers against mine.

Swallowing, I answer, "I didn't with Kagura. We never got this far, after."

"If it helps, I've never helped someone find their erogenous zones. I mean, I've suggested, based off scientific data, but it might violate a few HIPPA rules for me to look. Take your shirt off."

Leaning forward, I slide it off my shoulders and then lean back against the pillows, taking deep breaths. Just the thought that she is going to touch me lights a fire in the parts of my stomach I can actually feel.

Rin is adorable. She taps her lips, and smiles at me. Then slides up next to me, kissing the joint of my neck. The sensation makes me grip the bedsheets on either side. It tingles and burns all at once. I watch enraptured how the actions makes the material of my boxers start to twitch.

"Feels good?"

"Very much so."

"So your neck and sides." She sits on her knees and then licks my collarbone, nipping at the joint. "No?"

"Not as much as the neck."

"Okay." She grins like she's a girl again and then licks my pec, and sucks on my skin. It tingles, sending chills down my sides and goosebumps up my arms.

"Yes," I whisper, lost in the sensation. A tent is building between my legs. I'm tempted to wrap my fingers around myself as she explores.

She slides down further, licking my stomach. It's when she hits the middle of my stomach an uncanny whine leaves my mouth. "God…" My boxers are suddenly too tight and the pink tip of my penis pokes through the button holes.

"I think I found something."

It makes pressure build in my stomach as she works her mouth against my skin. Each flick of her tongue sends of waves heat into my back. I hold onto her head and gaze in shock at my shaft. It's bubbling at the top. Groaning, I release the button, freeing myself. She reaches for me and pumps me. I can't feel it, but watching it is so erotic. She runs her palm through the precum and then slides it down my shaft, massaging my tip while sucking harder on my belly. I can't breathe, only pant trying to keep up with how this is making me feel.

I'm lost in the feel of her mouth against my skin until time passes and she pats my shaft. "Stubborn guy. My mouths getting tired."

"I told you." I find a tissue to wipe the tip and close my boxers.

"It's okay." She lays down against my chest. "Is this making you hurt more?"

"Was I hurting?"

"Typical male. Distract you from the pain with a good hand job."

"Gave my mind something else to do." I rub her arm, delicately feeling her skin. "And you?" Kiss her passionately, nipping at her chin. "Can I do anything for you?"

"What do you want to do?" she asks me, obviously nervous and debating whether or not she wants to do this.

Sliding the back of my hand into her thin shorts and underwear, I search for her slit and the press against her clit with the back of my finger. "I don't want to be penetrated."

She's hot and wet. "Take your bottoms off."

"Okay," she says shakily and pushes them off. While she does, I push myself lower on the bed. "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing?" I pull myself up between her legs, mouth resting inches from her opening. Like this, I can see that she's already swelling, wanting more.

"What if it tastes weird?"

"I like the way it tastes."

"But you never tasted mine." She puts her palms on my forehead to stop my advance.

"Has no one done this for you before?" I tease the top of her opening. She wiggles beneath me.

"Shouldn't I wipe it off or something?"

"Rin?"

"Um…Bya did it once and said it tasted weird and he didn't like it. He was the first one and I guess—"

"Shh," I stop her, leaning down and gently kissing her lips that pine for attention.

She groans, gripping the top of the bed.

I lick one lip and then the other. Each time she flexes her muscles. "You're sure it's okay?" she asks me.

"I'm sure it's okay." I open her lips and lick the sides of her skin. Each time she groans and moans. Fingers thread through my hair. She's so moist inside, I can see it building. Sliding my tongue back up her slit and just before I take her bud in my mouth, the door opens.

"Shit! Miroku!" she shrieks, pulling the blanket over both of us, including my head. "Can't you knock!"

"Sorry!" the door slams closed and I collapse against her belly, pushing the blanket off me.

"Stop laughing," she tells me, sliding out from my body and closing her legs. "What do you want Miroku?"

"I was just going to see if either of you want to eat anything…well anything that's not—"

"Miroku!" she shrieks. I can actually feel her skin heating up and when I see her face, she's redder than a cherry. "We're fine!"

"I'm sure you are. We're going to bed…Sango you won't believe what they're doing!"

"Great," Rin groans and pulls her bottoms back on. "Mood killer. How's your pain?"

"It still hurts," I answer earnestly. Reaching for my bag of pills, I take out another Vicodin and swallow it with water. "But it's nice to not be alone."

We curl up for the night talking. I tell her about my father coming to the appointment, and that I have access to my trust fund again. She smiles and hugs me tightly, celebrating with me. "You should try to make up with him."

"Maybe," I whisper, feeling the medicine kick in again.

"How long does the pain last?"

"Hours sometimes, days. It changes. This time," I've been through this so often, I can gauge it by intensity, "maybe a day."

"You should stay until it stops. The surgery?"

"I have to schedule a cat scan and another EMG and an X-ray. But most likely in a month or so."

"I'm happy for you."

"Mmh," I sigh, holding her waist. "Goodnight Rin."

"Goodnight."

It's dark when I feel stirring next to me and hear the sounds of an alarm going off. I don't remember much of the night, besides waking up every now and then when one side flamed more than the other to painfully change positions. "Sorry," she tells me, sitting up, yawning and rubbing her eyes. She resembles a racoon in the moonlight but her lips are warm against mine. "It's five. Jak's going to be here in thirty minutes. Are you coming?"

I test the range of motion in my arms, waiting for the tell-tale burn of pain. It's dull but still there. "You look exhausted."

"You didn't sleep well. Half the night you moaned you sleep and whenever you woke up, I woke up too."

Guilt hits me square in the chest, because I don't quite remember last night. I remember tossing, trying to find a comfortable position and feeling like I was on a spit being roasted alive and nothing more.

"Massage seemed to help. Especially your neck and shoulders. I think it's over exertion and I forgot to tell you, I got you something." She reaches over to the nightstand pulls down a sealed package of sports gloves. "For your hands."

There are no words to express the gratitude I feel for this woman. I pull her against my still bare chest and kiss her lips, languishing in the taste of berries and cinnamon. "What have you been eating?"

"Sango makes an amazing sugar free cinnamon roll. Well low sugar. It's delicious and I was too tired for anything else last night."

"Now you know what it's like," I say, stroking her hair. "Are you ready to run?"

"Not yet. Who knows, one day I'll be sick of my ass and you'll be the one staying up all night to take care of me. Are you coming? You look so tired."

Throwing a forearm over my eyes, I consider how my body feels before responding, "I'll come."

The days seem to blur together as life swallows me. We spent the morning creating Rin's calendar between now and the qualifying rounds and settling on trying to get a score of at least 200. We focus on changing her diet, something I'm stickler about.

Professional sports are unforgiving on the body. If she wants the triples to be higher, she needs to have less to force into the air. But my own trauma with eating poorly comes back and it leads to an argument about how many calories she should eat and how quickly to try to take the weight off. In the end we agree no more than a pound a week and by February she should be light enough to land triples more comfortably without blowing out the knee.

In between training her, comes my own life. The day after I met with Dr. Hazan I went downtown to meet with the executor of my trust fund. Jaken is a squat man with a toad face that has worked with my father for as long as I can remember. He hands me the check for four thousand dollars and then takes my information to direct deposit the funds next time. "And if I want more?"

"You have to talk to your father."

Which led to a week later dear old dad and I sitting down for lunch in a deli in downtown Denver. He ate nervously, entirely unsure of what to say or how to behave. Should he move chairs for me? Open doors? At what point does it become coddling and in the end we only talk superficially because twenty years of fighting can't disappear overnight. "Jaken said you wanted more?"

"I'm trying become independent. In order to do that I need a car adapted so I can drive. Which involves getting a driver's license, which I can't get until the doctors and the rehab facility decide I am not a menace on the road."

"Driving lessons?"

"Yes."

"You're going to complete this time?"

"I'm not in as much pain as I was then, Dad. Neither am I freshly coming off a back injury and mourning my lost career."

"Fair enough," he answers me, setting down his french fries. "I take it these lessons don't come cheap?"

"Only a hundred dollars an hour. Everything I am currently making and again in order to take them, I must have my own car with the proper adaptations."

"What kind of car are you looking at?"

"Honda Kicks. It's affordable, but with a big enough trunk to store my chair and they have contracts with many local installation companies."

"New or used?"

"It depends on what I can afford. A new one is twenty grand. I sold the ring I bought for Kagura. I need around two thousand for the installation, two thousand for the lessons and twenty thousand for the car, plus taxes and fees. Whatever that comes to."

Taking another bite of fries, he chews thoughtfully. "I'll go with you to get the car—"

"It's not necessary." I don't need my father with me.

"Sesshomaru, I missed so much. Let me do this, teach me how to be the father you need me to be."

I'm a grown man. I don't cry in public, but it takes every last ounce of strength to refrain from breaking into tears, because my father, the man who has never been what I needed, finally wants to be.


	19. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Sesshomaru run into a bump in their relationship while she continues training the Denver Invitational

**Rin**

There's a mechanical whir in the room next to me that sounds like it's shaking the walls. I pulled a few strings to be in the room while the technician runs the CAT scan. Sesshomaru lays in the cylinder, hair tied into a tight braid. He isn't claustrophobic, but again, I didn't want him to be alone. If it weren't for the fact that he needs to stay still and not move, I'd be on the microphone talking to him.

He's been busy. Ren said he's learning to drive like a pro but that he ran over every cone in the parking lot yesterday. I watched through the window, curious how quickly he'd get the hang of using only his hands. The grey vehicle with the orange top swerved in and out of the cones, flattening them to pancakes.

At practice he barely spoke because he was mad he didn't master it right away.

Adaptations are kind of cool. I once asked Kagura if I could drive one of Wind's cars and nearly ran it into the building, smashing the fender. I'm lucky I was her favorite student or she would have made me pay for it. The technicians attach rods to the pedals that are manipulated by the push-pull system on the wheel. Each adaptation is fit and designed for the specific user. The driver decides which direction should control the break and the acceleration.

Pacing back and forth on sore feet, I check my phone again, looking through my emails to see when my new boots and blades will be here. I emailed the company and said I was dying of pain and dropped my name. Rin Matthews wants to make a comeback to the skating world. So rarely do I use my official title, but in this case my feet will be so happy when these damn things come. It shaved off two weeks of time and three hundred dollars.

"You can't use that in here," the tech reminds me.

"Right." I stuff it in my back pocket.

"Sit down, you're making me sick." Inuyasha grabs my wrist and pulls me into the chairs next to him and his father.

"Just nervous."

"What are they looking for?" Toga asks Inuyasha and I. He's been wringing his hands nervously, looking completely lost and perpetually silencing his phone.

"Damaged nerve tissue. He's already undergone repair surgeries that had varying success and failure, but they're seeing exactly which nerves are damaged and after that they'll find healthy nerves to replace them. They take them from areas of the body that aren't noticeable."

"Will he walk again?" Toga's voice cracks. I hold his hand, offering some reassurance. This isn't the first time I've brought a family back together. I once had a teen who smashed her mom's car up. She had a drinking and alcohol dependency and possibly the worst attitude I've ever seen. Kagura purposely made me work with her to learn empathy. To find the heart of the patient. To help her reconnect with her mother.

Come to find out that the girl's step father had been sexually abusing her at night. I nearly vomited when the girl broke down while trying to learn how to sit up again that she didn't want to go home because her step father was there. We reported the case to CPS, the man was arrested. Then began the painful job of helping the girl and her mother reconnect. It's not easy. Parents think kids are resilient and can handle anything, but that's not true. Everyone has a breaking point.

"I don't know," Inuyasha says, facing his father. "The cases that were operated on back in October are just coming back. The majority are regaining sensation. But they're all a long way from walking again. Their muscles are so deconditioned that they're going to have to start from the ground up. That's what will happen with him. Even if he gets range of motion, sensation and control back, his legs muscles have been dormant for four years. He'll have to learn to use them again and that all depends on how hard he's willing to work. My guess is, pretend the surgery is a complete success, he'd probably start walking again in another year or two once we rebuild the muscle."

"Knowing him, he'll turn it into a competition," I add in. "He's going to be fine Mr. Takahashi. You'll see."

"And we're done," the tech tells us. He pulls Sesshomaru out of the large cylinder. I go in to meet him. Our interactions are warmer since that night he spent at Miroku and Sango's. He kisses me and starts getting dressed. "Hot stuff," I make a big deal about eying him.

"Enjoying the view?"

"A little. Too bad there's something covering your bottom. Next time I think I'm going to lick those stripes on your stomach."

He shudders and nearly drops his pants. "You are a vixen."

"You're dad's waiting. Your phone rang a few times too. Here." I hand it to him. His eyes narrow in on the number and he stops dressing to listen to the message. "Who is it?"

"My mother," he doesn't sound happy. "I haven't told her yet that surgery is on the books for me." He starts rubbing his temples. I sit behind him, massaging his shoulders, something I do several times a day now to keep his arms and back from burning with the pain of constantly having to propel himself. "She must have phone privileges again."

"Does that mean you're going to be alone for Christmas?"

"Possibly. Inuyasha and Kagome are spending it with her family in New Mexico. I've gone a few times, but her in-laws house is in no way set up for the disabled."

"So you'll spend it with me and my family. We're going out of town to Powderhorn. There's a rink in Gunnison so I can still get some practice time in. I hate skiing."

"And you were going to tell me when?" he rebukes me.

"Sorry, I forgot until this morning. Sango called me to remind me about the reservation. Everyone cancels their appointments around this time. Band of Seven gave most of the staff off. Please? Come with me. It'll be fun. Romantic." I nuzzle his neck, just below his ears giving him goosebumps.

"I'd rather not face the doctors with an erection if you don't mind."

Sniggering into his back, I sit back and let him finish dressing. "Please?"

"Fine. I'll come. But it better be ADA compliant or I'm leaving."

"It is. We've been to this place plenty of times. It'll be fun."

One would think, with so much time around each other, we would have more time for things like what happened the night the pain flared up. But we don't. He's busy with his life, learning to drive, organizing his finances and days before we're meant to leave on our vacation to Powderhorn, he tells me that he can't come. "What? Why?"

We sit together after practice. Shippo and Kohaku are in the office with Kaede going over potential music. We've slowly patched a routine together, now all we need is music. Kohaku and Shippo are in charge of making sure it's the right rhythm to go with the moves, while it's my job to skate with Shippo while he shouts out the moves and does some of them with me. He can still land doubles when he wants to and makes it look almost effortless. We're halfway through planning the short program. It's almost surreal that I am committing to this again.

Leaning against Sesshomaru's shoulder, I press my mouth into his exposed arm. "I was kind of looking forward to having time with you off the ice. We've both been so busy, I feel like we haven't had time to be together."

"Together?" He tugs my chin out from his skin and asks, "is that what we are?"

"Why do you have to qualify it with words? I don't understand why that's so important to you."

"So I know that you are mine and that you won't find someone else. Why don't you want to call it something?"

"Because it doesn't need to be called something. Why can't we just be like this?"

"Because I don't know what this is!" he yells at me. "You invite me to the equivalent of your parents' home, attempt to find my…" he stumbles, "erogenous zones. That doesn't mean something?"

"Of course it means something! I told you I'm not ready for a relationship."

"No, you're just ready to act like we're in one and then emotionally hide when it's convenient." He moves away from me, heading for the door.

"Sesshomaru!"

He throws a hand up, stopping me from advancing. "Dammit," I mutter as he leaves, slamming the door behind him.

Why is it always two steps forward and one step back? Without my knowing, tears spring up in my eyes. I run into the locker room and hide in the shower, pretending like it's the shower pelting my cheeks, not my own tears.

"What do you expect from the man? No one and I mean no one but his brother has stuck by his ass in a way that's meaningful since he broke his back," Jakotsu tells me over a chocolate cake with fudge frosting and an Irish coffee. "That's going to go to your hips." I called Jak after Sesshomaru left. He gets guys, at least better than my brothers do.

"I don't care," I pout and stare at the ridiculously over the top chocolate cake in front of me.

"Yes you do care. You've got five months left to get in shape and make it count. Two bites and that's it."

"Three," I argue and lift the spoon. "You know I helped him when he was in pain. I even cathed him in his sleep."

"You touched his junk?" His face lights up. I'm reminded that Jakotsu has a massive crush on both Inuyasha and Sesshomaru.

"It's not like that. You need to get laid." I slowly lick the fork. Chocolate is amazing. It's a natural source of dopamine, which we often need to calm ourselves and feel good. "God this is so good."

"I got laid last night. Fine mother fucker. We've been together for two months now. Tall dark and chocolate. But listen, seriously Rinny, you don't get it. You saw only part of when it's bad for him. We both know what it can be like when it's really bad, but we've never had to live it. Kagura left him because she couldn't handle it."

"That's what I heard."

"No you don't get it. She came to us the next morning after he'd had this horrific stomach flu. She had hissy fit to Ban. She left him on the floor in the bathroom because she couldn't deal. Even if she had paid to hire someone to do the dirty work, she couldn't deal with it. She begged us to take him on and that's how we got him. She saw the worst and ran. In his head, you're rejecting him."

"I am not. I just…after Bya…"

"You can't keep using that asshole as an excuse to not fall in love. Do I need to break that mother fucker's knee caps to get him out of your head? Sesshomaru is an ass, but he's a nice ass. He has a nice ass, all round and shapely—"

"Jak…"

"Right…But have you really thought about what life with Sesshomaru would be like. You'd have to get IVF most likely to have babies. Stomach flus, he's in worse shape than someone who can walk. Not to mention, let's talk life expectancy, if this surgery doesn't work and he doesn't get up moving, he's going to be lucky to make it past fifty—"

"Don't say that Jak." Suddenly, I'm not so hungry. I know all too well what the statistics and data say. 10-20% don't survive the initial injury.

"The suicide rate is three times higher than the national average and even if he's in love with you, what happens when you two have a big falling out? When you get into a fight like an old married couple? If that man can't find it in himself to take the reins in his life, you're going to lose him to something else."

That just makes me fall into my hands and start crying even harder. "I love him," I whisper to Jakotsu.

"No shit. I have known you for a long time." He rubs my back in soothing motions. It all suddenly hits me why I don't want to be called a couple, or identified as his girlfriend, because if I do, everything I feel inside is going to come spilling out and then I'll be in love and if something happens it'll hurt. It already hurts. "Honey you can't hide from pain. We both know that. Our parents are watching us up in heaven saying go for it, take that love. Even if it's short lived."

I can't sleep tonight. I try watching the Notebook, but it doesn't alleviate the pain in my chest. By midnight, I get up and go to the kitchen to get some tea and cookies. Siphoning through our cabinets, I come up empty. We always have cookies, but this time I can't find them.

I duck under the sink, knocking things around, seeing if Kohaku hid any under there.

"What are you doing?" Kohaku asks me, coming out of his room half-dressed and bleary eyed.

"I can't sleep. Where are the cookies?"

"Are you having a panic attack?"

"No."

"No cookies then. But you can sleep in my room if it helps. Come on. Why are you still up?" I follow him back into his room and climb into the bed.

"Did you change the sheets last time you had sex?"

"Am I supposed to?"

"Ewww!" I shriek, about to get up until Kohaku's laughter stops me.

"Of course I changed them. Wouldn't want Ayame to figure out that Eri was here. Now, what's going on?"

"We got into a fight," I answer and curl against his back. "Why are you still single?"

"Because I can't find the right one."

"You find all the right ones, Hak. Why are you still single?"

"Are you projecting?"

"No. Maybe…"

I feel his breathing become deeper. "Love hurts. Maybe it's just easier to create shallow attachments, because if you don't fall in love, it doesn't hurt."

"Hak." I hug his shoulders. "But if you don't try, you'll be alone. Isn't there anyone?"

"I don't know. I never let anyone that close. Look you have a chance with Sesshomaru. Whatever is standing between you two, you just need to let it go. Miroku said you were getting hot heavy."

"He told you?" Can I scream into the sheets now? Nothing is sacred in my family. Mom missed my first period. Sango through a party that included Kohaku and Shippo and it felt so out of place having boys celebrate my womanhood. She'd probably do it for Kelsey and Keaton if I hadn't talked her out of it.

"Why wouldn't he? He wants to make sure you aren't hurt. We all like him. Don't be like me sis. Try to fix it, whatever it is."

"He wants me to be his girlfriend. I just…I don't know what to call it."

"If he's tonguing you—"

"Hak!" I slap his shoulder.

"Giving it a name isn't going to change what's happening between you, but if you keep avoiding it, you're going to lose him."

"I hate it when you're right."

"Now go to sleep, I have a 6am shift."

"Hak, what would our moms think of us running from love?" 

"They'd want to be with us."

* * *

Sesshomaru comes at one in the afternoon to work on driving with Ren. I watch him roll past me without making eye contact and then out the back door so they can jump into his car and practice again.

The car moves more slowly this time, going in and out of the cones with more control than the last time he drove. I watch him smiling, glad that he's finally getting the hang of it.

But he's distant when he comes in and works with Suikotsu. We pass quiet hellos. The normal banter is gone. "Did you two get into a fight?" Danny asks. "You're acting like my mom and dad when they get into fights."

"You focus on yourself," Jak says, ruffling his hair. "Leave the lovebirds alone."

I want to say we aren't love birds, but I already hurt Sesshomaru last night with what I said. By the end of his session, he leaves instead of waiting for me, not giving me a chance to try to apologize or explain why I said what I did.

I text him after, asking if he's still coming tonight to practice. He answers in the affirmative.

At the rink, he's colder than ice, only giving feedback and instructions. I still don't have a solid routine to practice,d we go through drills instead. He reminds me to make sure I'm on the right edges as I practice the flying camel. I used to be able to do a complete figure eight, but I can only manage to hold it for a few seconds. Another area I'll have to improve on. "Again," he shouts across the ice.

"Okay," I mutter and pick up speed doing it again. This time I put too much weight in the front of my body and face plant. "Ow…"

"Wonderful. At any point tonight are you actually going to try or are we both wasting our time?"

The words slice me to the bone. "I am trying."

"You're falling on your face."

"Are we really going to do this?"

"Do what?" he plays stupid, making me want to slap him.

"We should talk about what happened last night."

Shaking his head, he answers, "what's to talk about? We're not dating." His face is covered in harsh lines, making me wish I had never said what I did last night. "A coach and a skater." Using his hands to turn his wheels the opposite direction, he pivots left and starts rolling away from me.

"We're more than that and you know it. Look, I'm sorry. I told you I'm not good with men. I don't have a good track record with opposite sex and maybe I'm scared."

"Scared of what?" He stops without facing me.

I skate up to him, circling in front of him. "That this isn't going to last. That you're a dream and I'm going to wake up one day and you'll be like all the other guys."

"I'm not like them. I don't need to capitalize off your fame. I have my own." He slides his thumb along my jaw, making me shiver.

"I know," I whisper, barely able to breathe as he pulls me in closer. He kisses my mouth, timidly at first and then more forcefully. "I'm sorry."

He nods, letting me go. "Again."

We finish late into the night. It's dark outside. I miss seeing the sun. I wake up before it comes up and get home long after it's set. While I stretch, Sesshomaru starts to leave. "You aren't going to keep me company?"

"You know how to cool down on your own. You don't need me."

"Sesshomaru?" I feel like something hit my gut again.

"Mother wants me to spend Christmas at rehab with her. You can video me in when you practice. I'll watch from there and give you feedback, or have one of your brothers film it."

"Okay," I breathe out, wiping my nose, forcing back the growing emotions in my throat.

"When you get back, we'll have two weeks before the surgery. It's January 17th. I'll be out for two weeks. PT will be at home."

"Who's going to take care of you?"

"I'll be fine," he cuts me off, holding his hand up in the air. It feels like whatever existed between us before is being severed, like I'm losing him. "I have my brother, my father. You don't need to worry about me, Rin. We're not dating remember? I'll see you when you get back."

Each time I open my mouth, all I can do is stutter and stammer and before I can form a coherent sentence, he's left me alone.


	20. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru visits his mom for Christmas and then prepares for the big surgery. 
> 
> You can all thank Vilbern on FFN for this update. We came to an accord, she posts more Painted Veil, I post more Fire and Ice.

**Sesshomaru**

Christmas is quiet in the rehab facility. Mother sends an Uber to me in the early morning hours. Just after I've finished wrapping a present for her. She's easy to shop for, pearls, flowers, something sweet like a box of chocolates and shells from the ocean. Shells are always harder to find. I went to a shop downtown after meeting with dear old dad. It was nestled in the corner of main street, obscured from view with a Wicca sales attendant.

Some people believe that shells have meanings. Personally, I like conch shells because you can hear the ocean the loudest.

Oddly, I've been careful with the $4,000 a month. Usually I spend what I get, but this time I have saved it diligently. Despite this, I now owe dad the money for the car, which he'll deduct from the monthly allotment. He wouldn't relent on the amount issued every month, wanting to ensure that the funds last as long as possible.

Driving has been interesting to say the least. The first two weeks, my hands felt sloppy against the push-pull rod. It took time to get used to the feel of acceleration in my hand instead of my feet.

The lessons come with a hefty price-tag that Band of Seven has promised me to chase down Medicaid to pay. I won't hold my breath though. Apparently being able to sit behind the wheel again, isn't considered "medically necessary", leaving me more to pay out of pocket.

It's mid-morning by the time I arrive at the rehab facility. Mother is waiting for me, wrapped in a black shawl, with her silver hair tied up tightly. She comes up to the door and opens it.

I wave her off. I'm not as helpless as I was before, except when I have to wait for my wheels.

Transferring, is so much easier now than it was in the past. My core muscles are stronger. I can hold myself up on my hands and knees for minutes, where before even getting up like that was painful and shaky. "You look good," she tells me. After a month apart, she looks better too.

Her teeth are still yellow from the poison she's filled her body with for so many years. Don't get me wrong, I'm fond of a good a drink every now and again, but when you drink it like water and your belly swells from the toxins, you can see it in their eyes. Hers are colored like mine, amber and light in the sun. Pulling my coat back on to avoid the biting cold, I start propelling myself forward. "I didn't think you'd come."

I would have preferred to spend the time repairing what I lost with Rin, chasing after her like in some pathetic love story, but I've too much pride for that. It's hard to explain why it hurt as much as it did, that she won't call our relationship what it is. We've communicated only when she's skating. We use facetime and recorded sessions. I give feedback and she makes the adjustments while she's on vacation with her family.

I've spent the drive here telling myself that it isn't worth it. That it's better if we remain friends, or professionals. I don't know what percentage I will fall into after surgery, the sixty that regain sensation, or the forty that feel no change at all. It is better this way.

If I can't walk again, if nothing changes, one day she'll see what Kagura did. That I'm a shell of what I was, that I can't give her the life that she deserves and as comfortable as I feel around her, I know it can't last. All it takes is one stomach flu, one admission to the hospital with a blood clot in my leg, or a bout of flu or pneumonia and she'll leave. Afterall, who wants a husband they look down on?

"You don't look happy Sesshomaru," mother says, when we get to the common room. Others are here with their family. Some without. It's sparsely populated. She goes to the tree and pulls out an envelope wrapped in blue paper. We exchange gifts. She smiles at the conch I got her and presses it to her ear. "I love this sound. What's wrong? Are you worried about the surgery?" I told her about it before I came.

"No," it's only a half-lie. There's nothing like knowing one wrong move by the surgeon and my life could be worse than it is right now. Yet, if all the right ones are made, in a year or more, I could be on my feet again. "I was seeing someone."

Her face brightens. "Not that adorable physical therapist that came to the house after the pneumonia? Don't look at me like that. I'm your mother. You think I didn't notice you checking her out? Or the change of voice when you spoke about her?"

"I didn't realize you were lucid enough to notice."

Her eyes change colors and she sets the conch down.

"I'm sorry," she says humbly.

I've heard this before. There's a difference between _I'm sorry_ and changing. More than likely she'll relapse within days of returning home. "I mean it this time."

"Sure you do."

"Sesshomaru," she tries to get out.

Sitting back in my chair, I stare at the vaulted white tiled ceilings. "You don't expect me to believe you've turned a new leaf do you?"

"I'm trying—"

"You've been trying for decades—"

"I mean it this time!" she cries and her voice breaks. "You have no idea what it was like for me. Your father was so cold. I went along with what he had to say because he had money and prestige. Something I didn't know about before. When I had you everything changed. I wanted to be the perfect mother, to give you everything. The dreams never stopped. Your father and I were fighting all the time—"

"And after that?"

"I don't have an excuse!"

The admission stuns me into silence. There were always excuses before.

"I've spent years burying the pain. Each time I thought I moved passed it, something happened that made me go back to that place. The one thing I can control is how much I drink. I'm sorry. I should have been a better mother. If I had been, maybe I would have noticed you were too thin competing, or been there more after."

"You noticed that?" It's not common knowledge that I had an eating disorder. It's not something I shared with anyone but Inuyasha and Rin. Inuyasha by default. He nosed around in my medical documents after the injury.

"I notice everything."

Rubbing my eyes, I ask her, "Why didn't you say anything?"

"You told me you didn't need advice from a drunk remember? That you knew how to care for your body, unlike me."

I do remember. Mother came for dinner at my condo downtown. She brought a thick soup with beans and potatoes. Everything that I shouldn't eat. It was my childhood favorite. I refused to touch it. I was competing in Italy soon. I needed to be lean.

She mentioned I looked a bit thin, like I was losing muscle in my arms. I told her to mind her own business and haughtily reminded her that her best friend was Jack Daniels and neither she nor he had any business commenting on my physique. "You could at least open your present."

Nodding, I take it in my hands and start unwrapping it. Inside is a check for $5,000 dollars. "What is this?"

"Even before that comment when your nephew was at our house, I'd been saving it up. I thought maybe I would buy you a weight set or something. It's my contribution to your surgery. Your father shouldn't have to pay for all of it. $50,000 is a lot of money."

"Thank you," it comes out dryly, barely audible. I tuck the check away into my wallet. We drink coffee and eat cookies. She laughs when I tell her that I am coaching a figure skater.

"You aren't jealous it's not you competing?"

"Not really. More intrigued. I'm good at it. Granted I've had to spend hours investing myself into a sport I don't know much about and I can't model proper form for her. Her former coach allows us to train twice a week with her elite skaters, so they help her with that and we're pooling other resources to put on a good show."

"So you like her? You're turning red Sesshomaru, you like her a lot."

"Possibly."

"Is that why you're getting this surgery?"

The thought did occur to me that maybe I won't feel like a real man if I can't stand by her side. If she constantly has to look down on me and lower herself to be next to me, or if I can't give her the children she wants. I've never had my motility checked, because again it's unnecessary at the moment. Try getting Medicaid to pay for a fertility diagnosis when the closest thing to sex you've had in the last four years is your hand in the shower and no matter how you stimulate yourself, you rarely climax.

"No," I lie, "I want more than this chair mother. I always have."

"I always hoped you'd find peace with that chair."

"The way you did with the bottle?"

"I deserve that."

"Where do you think I learned self-pity from?"

"I don't deserve that," she points at me and sets her coffee down. "I never made you who you are. You chose to wallow and blame me for it. I don't want you getting your hopes up and being disappointed again. Not like last time."

"It's different this time."

"How?"

"These doctors are specialists. This surgery is different. I'm different." I tell her more about Rin, our time together and how it feels like the world has color again. The sky is more blue, the clouds higher, the air crisper. I leave out that we've had a falling out and I don't know where we hold now. "She makes me feel again."

"I just hope you're doing this for the right reasons. I…" she stammers through the sentence. "I'm going to come out to help you."

"No."

"Yes."

"No…you have two more months here."

"And who is going to take care of you for the first two weeks when you aren't supposed to lift more than five pounds? Who's going to stay in your room at night?"

I turn away from her.

"Are you going to let some candy striper into our home? You didn't the last three surgeries!"

I drop my mug and bury my face in my hands. I haven't planned that far ahead. I haven't asked Inuyasha or my father. Neither know that I can't even lift myself out of bed after the surgery. 5lb limit.

"Sesshomaru, I promise this time is different. I'm not going to drink again."

"Why should I believe it this time?"

"Because this time I'm not going to hide from the pain any longer. And neither should you."

Inuyasha drives me to the rink the day Rin gets back from vacation. It's one week to my surgery. The doctors have told me there is a fighting chance to reconnect the neural tissue in my spine with nerves from other areas of my body. I've had more sleepless nights as of late, filled with anticipation and worry. Mostly anticipation with the hope that I'll be able to walk again and fear that once again my body will let me down.

"Should I pick you up at seven?" he asks me.

"No I'm going to take an Uber home," I answer. "Inuyasha, did you apply for residencies outside of Denver?"

"We had a deal," he says with a forlorn look. "I said I would."

"When do you find out?"

"March 5th. Maybe you two can work it out before then? So I can feel like someone has your back if I leave."

"When you leave. A deals a deal," I remind him, closing the door behind me. He's given up enough of his life for me.

I'm here before Rin. Which is an odd feeling because usually we take the light rail together, with her eternally sitting in my lap like it's her royal thrown. My lap feels empty without her.

I go out on the ice and watch the skaters. They go up in smooth motions and land on the outside edge of their blades, spin without travelling and fluidly move from one move to the next. Gymnastics is much the same. Each technique leads to the next. The smoother the transitions the higher the scores.

I'm lost watching them, jotting down notes, when I feel a tap on my shoulder. "Hey," Rin says.

"Hey," I reach out and take her hand, squeezing her fingers, attempting to reconnect. "Ready?"

"I need to warm up still. Shippo and I worked on my routine." She hands me a stack of papers, a written routine for me to critique the techniques. "We calculated the points. We're going to try to break 170. That should put me in the top ten at least. If I'm lucky the top four."

The air is thick between us. I miss the naturalness of our relationship and how seamlessly we came together. "Go on then. Warm up."

She skates off, doing laps for ten minutes, then starts tracing lazy circles on the ice. Next comes spread eagles, flying camel, spins and then jumps. She lands a single, then a double and then pushes herself and lands a triple salchow, triple lutz and then a triple toe loop.

She's like a ballerina on ice. Poised and beautiful, skating circles around me. Her heart isn't in it. "Stop!" I call her after she nearly slides into the backboard doing a triple, double combination.

"What?"

"Where's the passion? Start again."

I count off the beginning for her. She moves forwards on the ice and then back. A flying camel sends her across the ice, dodging other skaters as she goes and then circular foot work until she sets up the first jump. She leaps into the air, missing the outside edge again and this time buckles, slamming her butt into the ice. "Ouch."

"Enough," I motion her over, waving my hand. "What's going on?"

"I don't know," she answers, shifting her weight. Her eyes are distant, staring off to the side. There are unshed tears in those eyes.

"Bad vacation?"

"No, it was fine. We had fun."

"Then what is it?" As if the tension in the air isn't a big enough indicator of what's wrong.

"Why am I doing this?" She motions at the ice.

"You tell me."

"I miss skating. I feel alive when I'm skating. Like I'm flying, but right now," she shifts her weight until her legs are draped over mine, "I feel like we've lost something. Like bringing you into my world stopped whatever was happening between us," the end comes out in a whisper. Brown eyes glaze over in tears.

"I don't think skating did that," I force honesty through my lips. If she only knew how she changed my world. If I felt more cruel in the moment, I'd remind her that she did that.

She nods, flicking a tear from her cheek. She takes a deep breath. "Either away, this isn't going to help me get where I want to go."

"And where's that?"

"The top four. The top four competitors get to go to sectionals, and if I score high enough there, I could go to US Championships, grand prix, Worlds next year."

"Is that what you want?"

"The more I talked with Shippo and Hak while we were on vacation, yeah. I let it go before. I didn't even try. It's taken me ten years to want it again, but I do. Do you think I have a shot?"

"I think you have a fighting chance but your score has to get closer to 230. You're going to have to take training more seriously."

"I am serious."

"Not if you can't think past what's happening between us."

"But you're having life altering surgery in a week."

"Life changing possibly." I take her hand again, massaging her knuckles, "but that doesn't change what you need to be doing right now."

"Is your family going to be there?" She cups my face. "I don't want you to be alone."

I hold her hand against my cheek, "I won't be. We're not dating Rin. I'm not you're responsibility anymore. Now go, we have a lot of work to do." Off she skates, taking my heart with her. That is the nature of competition, you have to want it more than anything, more than us.

The morning of the surgery comes faster than I expected. Mother came home the night before. She wakes me at five in the morning so we can at Denver Medical by seven. No matter how I tried to make her stay in rehab, she wouldn't hear it.

She slept in my room knowing how poorly I fast. Hunger makes me dizzy and inevitably gag. She was armed all night with emesis basins, leaving us both exhausted.

It doesn't help that I've been in pain for three days from pushing myself to get the final practices in with Rin. Rin knew, but this time I refused her offers to stay at Miroku and Sango's.

"Will the surgery do anything for the pain?" mother asks me while loading my chair into the trunk of the car.

"Hypothetically it will fix the misfiring between my brain and my body." I lean back in the passenger seat, resting my eyes.

I'm looking forward to being knocked out to keep my body from aching.

Rin texts me, **Good luck** , with a smiley face. I told her to sleep in today and take the day off.

Each light to the hospital feels like agony. Like we're going at a snail's pace. I want to walk again, to run, to feel my legs. A part of me wants to cancel it, to call it quits before it starts.

I've never been good at quitting. Mother used to brag to her friends when I first started Gymkhana that no matter how I hurt myself, I never gave up.

The first time I learned the horizontal bar I was six years old. We were learning to make what they call a window. You hang from the bar, raising your feet in a V, touching the balls on the bar. Other boys in the class struggled. I made the window on the first try but then slipped and landed on my back with a splat. It hurt. I brushed it off and did it again.

Each time I hurt myself, broke a bone, dislocated a shoulder, I went back and tried again. That's why I swallow the bile rising in my throat from not eating and drinking and focus on what could be.

What if I could walk again…

By the time I'm in the prep room, my skin is crawling with nerves. I ignore the nurse as she places the IV's in my arm.

I try to focus on what the doctor is saying. I'll be intubated after I'm put to sleep and then rolled onto my stomach, bare for the world to see. They'll make a three inch long incising just above my tailbone and another one in my chest, taking redundant nerves from there.

Reconnecting the surrounding tissue will take an extremely long time. The axons grow at 1mm a day. Patients begin to have sensation again at 6 weeks out, but most don't regain function until 6-18 months out.

They'll load me with steroids and antibiotics, followed by three months of immuno-suppressants.

"You ready?" Lindsay the nurse asks me.

"Sure." I give mom's hand a squeeze. She's taken out to the waiting room where Inuyasha, Kagome and my father wait. Surgery will take twelve hours, they'll be waiting a while.

In the operating room I'm stripped of my gown and laid back on the table. I've always hated these rooms. Their bright white with little life in them, increasing my anxiety.

At any moment my nerves are going to take over. I bury my head in my hands, attempting to take deep breaths. It doesn't help when the EKG picks up a high a heart-rate and the alerts start to blare. "Just relax," Nurse Lindsay tells me.

Relax…when my back is about to be cut into? "Lay back," the dark skinned anesthesiologist adjures me. Attempting to catch my breath, I slowly lay back and focus on the feeling of the operating bed beneath me. "Come on Sesshomaru, aren't you supposed to be the brave one?"

I see the door open and in walks my little brother in scrubs.

"How did you get in?"

"I pulled some strings with Dr. Okinawa. I promised him Kagome would make some stuffed mushrooms and bruschetta." He pulls a chair up next to me and takes my hand. "Remember that time we went camping in the mountains and we found that tree that had a limb on it that looked like a seat?" He nods at the anesthesiologist.

I laugh. "You were afraid to climb."

"Terrified." I start to feel drowsy. It's hard to open or close my mouth.

"You hefted me up on your knees. You were so strong because you had already been in gymnastics for so long. You said it was easier to lift me than…" I can't hear him. The world goes dark and I dream.

I dream of the home on the beach but this time a large willow grows in the front yard. She's dressed in white, sitting on the branch, but no matter how I climb, I can't reach her. "Rin…where are you?"


	21. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru refuses Rin after surgery until she decides to matters into her own hands. Quite literally.

**Rin**

I wish relationships were easy and uncomplicated. I wish that I was brave enough to just tell Sesshomaru that I love him. But I'm not.

It's so cold outside. At least I can pretend the cold is from sitting on the veranda at Sango and Miroku's and not what I feel inside. I should be at the hospital with Sesshomaru, but he said he would be fine.

I texted him this morning. He never got back to me, so I'm left to hope that everything will be fine. "Feeling any better?" Sango asks me, sitting to my left.

"Not really. My stomach is still in knots."

I threw up twice this morning. I called Ban to let him know I was sure it was just nerves. He told me to take the day off to avoid infecting our immune-compromised patients. Which means I shouldn't go to the hospital either.

For the seventh time I check my phone. It's only nine in the morning. He's already under the knife by now. The last time I called Inuyasha, he didn't answer either.

Sango touches my forehead and hands me a fresh cup of tea. "If you aren't sick yet, you're going to make yourself sick sitting out here."

"How did you know Miroku was the one?" I lift the mint tea up to my lips and sip it gingerly.

"When he said he'd parent two kids with me at the age of twenty one." She chuckles and scoots closer to me, pulling me against her chest. "There's no formula. Knowing they're the one doesn't mean the rest of it's easy. Miroku and I fought all the time at first."

"Every time we get close he pushes me away."

"Are you sure you aren't pushing him away? You said at Christmas that he wanted some kind of commitment from you. To know you were his. You can't very well hold him close if you won't let him be more to you than a friend and coach. Not to mention I'm not sure a coach should have his head between his skater's legs."

"Sango!" I wiggle in my chair remembering that night.

"It's not just him," Sango picks up a blanket and wraps it around both of us. "If you love him, you need to tell him and stop avoiding what you feel. Love is wonderful. Hard work but wonderful. You hurt him Rin."

By the afternoon I'm falling over from exhaustion, from skating, from ballet that I started two weeks before and lifting weights on the side.

I fall asleep on the couch.

I'm not sure how long I've been sleeping when my cell phone wakes me from my puddle of drool. "Hello?" I answer groggily.

"Hey, it's Kagome."

"Kagome?" I sit up quickly, trying to force myself awake. "How is he?"

"They finished. They said the surgery went as expected. We should know in six to twelve weeks whether or not he'll regain sensation."

"That's great. Can I talk to him?"

I hear hesitation on the other end of the phone. "He doesn't want to see you right now."

"What?" I feel like someone just flattened my stomach with a mac truck.

"I'm sorry. He gets like this when he's hurting and feels vulnerable. He won't let anyone in the room with him but his mother. He told us all to leave and he'd call us when he's ready for visitors. I'm really sorry."

"Thanks for calling me," I spit out and hang up the phone, bursting into tears. I deserve this.

He doesn't call me over the next two weeks. My texts go unanswered, calls ignored.

I spend the time settling back into my routine. Five am wake up and then off to the rink for practice. On lunches I lift the weights at Band of Seven with Jakotsu. Twice a week I have ballet. I'm getting stronger and more confident. My muscles are growing. I'm losing lines of fat. It's easier to get into the air.

I throw myself into training, determined to do something besides mope. Each practice we record and send to Sesshomaru so that he can send back small remarks here and there as he's able.

I tried to call his house, only for his mom to reject the call.

I spent the night in Kohaku's bed bawling my eyes out. At least my new boots came in the mail.

By the third week, when I expected him back, he lets me know by text that he's not ready yet and the pain is still too intense.

Shippo takes up where Sesshomaru left off. We memorize my short program. At week four, we start on the long program. Sesshomaru stops returning my emails about my programs. A great emptiness fills my soul. I miss him.

"You're looking great," Shippo tells me after I finish the long program, huffing and puffing for air.

"I need to work on that first pass. You think I can still score high without a triple pass?"

"No…either you land a quad or you land a triple jump pass."

"Do you think he'll come back?" Shippo asks me.

"I don't know," I bite my lower lip and shake my head. "Everything was riding on this surgery."

"Is he feeling anything yet?"

"He's not talking to me."

"He's being an ass," Kohaku comes up from behind us and sits on the railing of the rink.

"Don't call him that," I argue back.

"I'll say what I want. If he loves you, he should want you there with him."

But even I know it's not that simple and you don't get to make the rules in someone else's journey.

The fourth week comes and Sesshomaru finally tells me to start videoing him on the practices. It's still too uncomfortable for him to get around.

I asked Suikotsu how his at home therapy is going. He told me Sesshomaru said not to tell me anything. He watches me intently, gives feedback but when I try to ask him how the recovery is going, the conversation is automatically shifted back to skating or ended.

By the fifth and sixth week I really start worrying. His text messages taper off.

Rather than wallow, I use the emotions to skate, letting them guide me, to make a program that tugs at the heart.

Shippo, Kohaku and I choose music from the Last Samurai to skate to and by the seventh week, when Sesshomaru doesn't return any of my text messages or calls and stops participating in video-practices, I'm fed up. I decide to go to his house the next week after work. Sango said if I love him I'd say something.

I must look like a ballet dancer going up and down the steps to their ranch home in Highland's Ranch. It's all on one level with a large ramp going up to the front door.

I have no idea why I am pirouetting like an idiot up and down the steps to the house.

His mother flings open the door wearing something that resembles lingerie, smoking a cigarette. "Um…" I start and then stop. _I'm the idiot that broke your son's heart._

"You're Rin," she says, sucking the last bit of her cig and flicking it onto the rose bushes. A collection of cigarette butts gather around the stems like they are worshipping the canopy of pink buds. "I should hate you for giving him hope." That's enough for me to know he hasn't regained any sensation.

I incline my head because truth be told I hate myself too. I know the only reason he hasn't called me is because he hasn't felt anything more than he did before and because of what I said before Christmas. I should have said I love you then.

"We've decided to switch to Wind," she says slamming the door, making my heart race and rattle my chest.

I have about three seconds to think to wedge my foot into the frame and slam my palms against the door. My foot flames in pain. "Look…I…I don't even know what to say—"

"Then say nothing." She folds her arms, turning on me, waving me into the house.

The living-room is a shrine to his days as an athlete. The mantle draws me like a flame to a fire. He must be eleven years old, on the rings, holding himself upside down. I smile going to touch the glass only to smear the actual picture.

"We stopped putting the glass in after he wouldn't stop breaking them. Rings were always his best."

"I could throw a killer quad toe loop and a quad salchow. I was a prodigy they said, the best figure skater had seen since Christy Yamaguchi. I was set to win the gold. I could have easily placed in the top four."

"He mentioned that."

"Is he home? I brought ice-cream." I hold up the bag that's gone a bit soft. "Rocky road, get it?"

She snorts at me and points to the hallway.

I make my way back, breathing heavier with each step. I want to blame it on smoke inhalation outside but I know it's more than that. I hurt him.

I hear cheering, judges talking. "Sesshomaru Takahashi is attempting one of the most difficult moves in competition on the rings. Triple salto from a bowd. You see that." The crowd cheers. I am frozen in place, watching his TV-screen move. His hair was shorter then, cropped and perfectly folded over. His arms don't even tremble as he holds himself like a board face down. "Now it's coming, a triple salto pike. He loops for momentum!" He goes up, flipping once, then twice with his legs perfectly straight in front of him but something happens with the third rotation and instead of landing on his feet, he lands on his back, right where his sacrum meets the lumbar. He flops onto the mats, unmoving. _"Jack, he's not getting up."_

_"_ _Something is wrong, something is definitely wrong. His coach is calling for the paramedics."_

I can finally breathe when he rewinds it and turns it on again. I push the door open holding up my price of Ben and Jerry's Rocky Road ice-cream. "Hi."

"Apparently you can't take a hint." He flicks the TV off.

"I brought rocky road? Get it?"

"Jokes aren't your strong suit." He sets the remote down and looks away from me.

"I would have brought Carmel Sutra but I thought that was too kinky." I climb into his bed and suddenly realize how beautiful his room is. It's easily twice the size of my bedroom at home, with a ramp that leads out to a large backyard with a winding path behind that. The sun is shining so brightly it's nearly blinding. I leave the ice cream on his dresser and go over to his patio doors. "I bet this is beautiful when you get all the planting in."

He's set up tables around his room with seedlings that will be ready to transfer when the last frost passes. It's mid-march, meaning soon the world will bloom with color.

"I'd join you but then I would have to be able to get up."

"Sesshomaru," I exhale turning around. "I…I'm sorry."

"Hope is worse than evil. At least evil has a purpose."

"It can take up to twelve weeks," I remind him and sit down on the bed taking my sweater off. I'm wearing a maroon crop top that winds a cord around my neck and mid-rise leggings that leave a decent amount of my stomach exposed.

"Now that is not fair." He pokes my belly button, making me arch forward to escape his fingers, but instead all that has happened is that my head nearly nocks into his. When I look up, his mouth is just millimeters from mine.

"What's not fair?" As I breathe, my lips brush against him making my ribs hitch. "I thought all men wanted to be in bed with a beautiful woman."

He closes his eyes and clenches his hands together. "That would imply you are beaut—" Oh fuck no.

I fumble on the top of his dresser. I rip the lid off the Rocky Road. It's already soggy on top from being in my car. I slam it into his face.

I should have known than to pick a fight with a paraplegic.

He pins me down on the mattress in one arm, lifting the ice-cream up in the other with a confident smirk. His usually pale skin is now covered in chocolate. I'm fairly certain he has a walnut shell stuck in one nostril. He leans over me and rubs his face against mine.

Now I'm covered in chocolate, marshmallows and nuts. I crack up as he tickles the flesh of my stomach. As he pulls back, I bite and lick the tip of his nose. I can feel his laughter bubbling. It's like we haven't been apart for two months.

When we get up, the ice cream is all over his chest, my hair, his hair and my face. "You are in so much trouble, Sesshomaru."

The bin of ice-cream is on the floor with the spoons. I bend over to get it and don't realize until I'm sitting up again, holding the spoon and the container with a fat slab of ice-cream on it that I'm straddling his hips. This time I plop it on his nose.

He doesn't resist when I lean forward and lick the almonds and marshmallows off. I lick his cheeks. He leans into my mouth. I kiss his forehead spreading my lips to clean his skin then come down to his mouth. He leans forward, tangling his fingers into the hair at the base of my skull. I dip my tongue into his mouth. He tastes like ice-cream and coffee. My hips roll against his, making me moan lightly into his lips.

He tilts my neck to the side. His mouth works against the tender skin of my neck. I know it's early spring time but now I'm really sweating and panting as his hands work up the back of my shirt. I grip his shoulders like they are the only thing I have to hold onto as is tongue runs the length of my chin, down to my collar bone. He cleans the other side of my neck where random flecks of marshmallows are stuck to my chin. I pull back smiling like a school-girl who just had her first kiss.

I push him back and take another slab of ice cream, and trace it over his chest and stomach where he had felt so much pleasure before. Licking it off slowly, I nibble his collar bone and suck on his pecks. Each motion makes him suck air in.

I catch his eyes before I go down to his stomach, where I know he's the most tender. I hold his sides, massaging the skin. Tenderly I lick and flick the lines of his stomach until I hear him groan and his pants start twitching. Pulling back, I slide off his lap and set the ice-cream between us. I pick the spoon up and take a bite. "What is this Rin?"

"Close your eyes." I encourage him, so tired of there being so much distance between us.

"Why?"

"Just do it," I beg him, straddling his hips again. He's hard beneath me.

His eyes close so slowly. All I can feel is the pressure of his forehead against mine.

My nipples harden when I take my shirt off. My lips burn when I press them into the crook of his neck, already knowing this is one of his erogenous zones.

I take my time, biting down on his collar bone, when his eyes snap open as warm hands travel down my back. "Rin?" He pulls me up by my shoulders.

"I want you," I whisper against his lips.

"You don't have to have sex with me to cheer me up."

I shrug my shoulders. For the first time I want this and I'm not going to stop. I capture his lips, not allowing him a chance to refuse. "Make love to me? Please?"

He's panting against me. "You don't want a relationship with me."

"I do." I lift his hand and press his palm against my nipple. "You can call me your girlfriend, whatever you want."

"Girlfriend?"

"Yeah."

He gingerly massages my breast in one hand and then with two. The sensation gives me chills. I lick his neck, pushing his hair back and sucking on the skin. His lips come back to mine. We explore each other's mouths, the taste, the texture, the heat.

He breathes harder, leaning back and groaning as I bite and lick the muscles that have formed on his chest. I kiss one pec and then the other, sucking on them, which makes him dig his fingers into my hair.

He pulls me back up. I press my chest into his face, rocking against the lips that have encapsulated my nipples. It's so hot between my legs I feel like I'm going to burn from the inside out. He pushes me onto my back and rolls onto his side fumbling with my leggings and slides them down my legs. He uses pillows to support his trunk. I wrap my bare leg over his hip and pull myself back to him. He licks my breasts again. I've never gone all the way before. I can't stop myself. I've spent five months getting him out of his mental dungeon. He pulls back and runs a crooked finger up and down my chest, looping my nipple I smile. "What is it?"

He lifts his body more upright. I watch as he pushes his pants and boxers down his legs and tosses them on the floor. He opens his mouth to speak then closes it, laying back down with me. He caresses my cheek. I press my mouth back into his. "Have you ever been with a handicap before?"

"No," I laugh at him. "Do you want to stop?" I touch his erection. He's so hard and already bubbling. I make up my mind to focus on pleasuring on him, not on whether or not I can make him come, but I want him to so bad.

"No," he says firmly, hitching my hip up higher. "I want to taste you."

I know my cheeks are red because my ears are burning and suddenly I'm nervous because I missed my last wax and last time we got interrupted.

He pushes me back on his pillows while he lies on his side and leans over me, worshipping my top half. His tongue glides, tracing lines until they lap at my nipples, then he lays wide mouthed kisses down my stomach, until I can feel his breath against my curls.

"Scoot up," he says so sensuously, the sound of his voice gives me goosebumps. I move higher in the bed, while he shimmies himself lower and props pillows around the bare hips he can't move. I'm aching now and his breath is coming out in low pants. I grip the railing above his bed as his hands slide up my legs and he kisses and licks the inside of my thighs. "Mmh," I groan. It's like my insides are begging for attention.

He kisses closer and closer until he licks one lip and then the other. It isn't until that first suck on my clit that I'm sure I've gone to heaven and can't breathe. I moan loudly.

He stops, coming out of the forest below and whispers, "shh. My mother will hear you."

So I bite my lip the through the next lick, this one is a nip that sends shivers up my back, and I squeak as he finds me again and starts sucking. I grip the back of his head and try to keep my legs open but all I want to do is curl around his mouth. I wonder if he can see my hymen, does he know I haven't gone all the way before. A voice inside of me tells me to speak up, but I'm lost in the slow licks he gives the inside of my labia and the quick sucks on my clit and how he doesn't let up. I have to bite the pillow to keep from crying out in pleasure. It burns down my slit, back up to my stomach. I want more.

My hips find a rhythm with his mouth and then I can feel that first breach. He dips two fingers in like I've done this before and an, "ow," comes out of my mouth before I have a chance to stop it.

Sesshomaru immediately pulls back with a confused look on his face. He opens me, letting the sunlight guide him. Glancing at me with an arched eyebrow, he asks, "Were you going to tell me about this?" He pushes against my opening again and I cringe.

I bite my lower lip. What am I supposed to say? I thought it would be stretched out by now from all the splits I did, all the times I landed on my crotch in practice, I didn't realize there would be something left to break.

"You want me to be your first?"

I nod my head. When he smiles, I want to shove my crotch back into his face. He's one of those people that saves their smiles for when he thinks no one is looking. "Relax," he says as one finger slides in this time. He pumps it back and forth against the roof of my vagina. I curl around his head again, humping his hand. It burns and stings in all the right ways.

The second finger enters and I flinch as he scissors. "I'm just stretching you. Come closer." He uses his hand on my ass to guide my crotch back to his mouth. It's like watching him drink the way his lips pucker against me and suck. I can't stop the sounds coming from my mouth. I want it harder, deeper. I need more.

As he starts thrusting his fingers something changes, a light goes off down there. I feel hard and wound like a rubber band and grip his shoulders trying to escape what's about to happen.

His fingers move in and out faster. I scream while gripping his support rod that is attached to the wall above his bed. "Fuck! Oh Fuck! Oh Fuck! Oh god, oh…mmmh!" I scream and he comes out laughing, but keeps his fingers engaged.

My body is shaking. "Fuck," I whisper.

"I think that is what I just did." He pushes himself higher on his pillows. He's very hard now and waving like a flag.

"Can I…I want to ride you." I run my hand across the muscles just above his navel, making his mouth drop open.

He takes my hand. I'm shaking and wet. I straddle him, while he licks my neck. He can't move so I know now it's up to me. "Slowly," he supports my shoulders while I grab him. Fuck he is so hard and so hot. "Come down slowly."

I cringe at first. He is definitely bigger than two fingers. He lets go of one shoulder and starts thumbing my clit again. I feel my walls looking for something to squeeze.

I'm suddenly nervous. "If you were on top what would you do?"

"For a virgin, sometimes the kindest thing is to just get it over with."

"Okay," I close my eyes and sit down quickly, taking him in. Falling onto his chest, I cry for a moment at the sting and how he stretches me. "I feel like you're in my stomach."

"I said come down slowly."

"You said get it over with!" A small sob breaks out of my mouth. "It hurts." It burns and stings. I wrap my arms around his shoulder, dripping tears down his skin. I'm such an idiot, of course I shouldn't have just slammed myself down on him.

"Shh," he hushes me, brushing his lips against mine. "Do you want to stop now?"

"No," I whisper defeated. "I want this."

Sesshomaru wipes my tears, taking them away with his thumbs, while kissing my lips. "You're going to be sore." He laughs against my mouth. His hands run up my back and tangle into my hair.

"Do you feel it?" Wouldn't it be great if the first thing he felt was me?

He smiles and says, "my mind does. It feels good. When you're ready, start rocking your hips against me."

"I love you," it slips out like I can't control myself and his face contorts into something I haven't seen before.

"Touch my stomach?" he asks me, bringing my hands just above his belly button. His face alights in pleasure and euphoria as I massage the muscles and start rocking against his hips. It's so intense like this. I lean over him and combine the stomach massage with sucking on his neck.

He doesn't moan, not like me. I can tell he's going somewhere and it feels good by how his mouth sags open and he opens and closes his eyes, grunting and biting the inside of his cheek. He grabs my ass in both hands pushing me down harder on top of him. I feel myself aroused but not like before. "Touch me?"

Silently a hand slides between my legs and begins rubbing my clit side to side. I push harder against him, rocking faster and faster.

I hump him so hard it hurts before we both explode in a symphony of orgasm. I feel warmth inside of me and collapse on his chest. He's so warm and so comforting All I can do is lay against his chest. Until I start thinking about that admission I made and that he said nothing in return.

It's true though. I love his laugh. The wrinkle around his eyes, the way he is such a macho man but so tender inside. He's a fighter in the guise of the devil and there is just something so beautiful about a man who won't give up. I rest against his chest, my eyes buried in his neck to avoid them, to avoid having my love rejected. I can feel him deflating inside of me. We didn't use a condom.

My mind is racing trying to figure out what to do with what I said and that he isn't returning it.

His arms are wrapped around me. He is breathing just as heavily as I am. In the last five months they have become so much stronger than they were before. I can feel the curves of his biceps, the way the tendons in his wrist flex against the skin of my back as he runs his hands up and down my spine. It's so comforting that I start feeling drowsy in his arms.

Why did I say that I loved him? Why does it hurt so much that he isn't saying it back?

Embarrassment gets the better of me when I sit up to see him staring into my eyes. "I shouldn't have said that." I climb off his lap, ignoring the liquid leaking down my thigh. "I shouldn't have done this."

"Rin wait—"

"No it's okay really…I'm sorry. This was inappropriate, amazing…wonderful but I really shouldn't have."

Why couldn't he just say it back? He was the one that kissed me first. Was I imagining that he felt something?

"Rin—"

I grab my clothes off the floor, half tripping as I pull them back on. "No it's okay…really Sesshomaru. I'm sorry." Am I really sorry? When I'm finally dressed and he's still sputtering, reaching for his own pants to put back on I say, "I'll see you tomorrow." Absentmindedly, my fingers find the webbing between his toes, pinching down, just to blow off some steam.

He jolts forward reaching for his foot. "ouch! Rin that hurt!" His chest is heaving when I look up…I can't breathe…the air is stale between us. "Rin…that hurt."


	22. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru and Rin bond over their newfound love.
> 
> You can all thank Vilbern who updated the Painted Veil and Smmahamazing who made a gorgeous inukik pic on tumblr. :)

**Sesshomaru**

I felt that. I felt her fingers between my toes and the sting of pinched flesh. Suddenly, I've forgotten how to breathe, how to think, or even move. I've forgotten that she said she loved me, that we made love.

I reach for my toes, caressing the webbing. I can feel it.

"You felt that?" she asks me, sitting next to my toes. She reaches into her bag and pulls out a pen. She tests my Babinski reflex. I feel nothing until she comes up to my toes, between the webbing. The large toe moves ever so slightly to the side.

"I…"

"You should call your doctor. I'm so happy for you," she says, but her heart isn't it. Her eyes are ringed with something undefinable.

She begins checking my other foot. The sensation is similar, only slightly lower. I can feel the top of the ball of my foot. She encourages me to lean back, and runs the pen down my stomach, starting above my navel, across my hips. I feel nothing lower than I have in the past.

Reaching for my phone, I call my Neurologist, as instructed. The nurse answers and we run through the normal routine, name, date of birth. I'm so lost in telling her I felt sensation I'm repeating myself, getting ahead of myself. The doctors wants to see me in the morning. The office is closing soon and has no more openings.

I didn't know a room could feel so empty. When I look up again, she's gone, sucking the excitement out of the moment. I made love for the first time in four years and it isn't until I look down and see the white silhouette coating me that I know I orgasmed. Shit…

"Rin!" How long ago did she leave the room? Reaching for my pants, I pull them on as quickly as I can, then grab my chair and transfer. "Rin!" I yell again, hoping she'll hear me. My heart is racing. Every moment since the accident I have spent alone and it hurts that she would leave me now. Not that I blame her, I should have held her more closely to my heart, rather than push her away.

I wheel out of my room, down the hall, searching for her. "Rin!"

"She left," mother says from the couch. Her face is buried in a murder mystery.

I move past her to the door. I can see Rin through the window, chewing her bottom lip, a nervous tick I know she has.

A car pulls up, giving me only seconds to get out the door and blast down the ramp to stop her from leaving. "Where are you going?"

"Home. It's getting late and I have to work and hit the ice in the morning. And probably find a new coach because mine's been missing for six weeks." She steps towards the car, but I'm not letting her go so easily.

"Rin please?" Catching her by the wrist, I stop her from getting into the car. "Talk to me. I want to share this with you."

"Now you want to share it with me? What about before? I wanted to be with you in the hospital and after and you wouldn't let me near you!" She breaks into tears.

She's right. I woke up so groggy from the long surgery it took me hours to be able to form coherent sentences. As the anesthesia wore off, the pain came and it was considerable. It wasn't nearly as bad as when I have flare ups, but still it hurt to move, to transfer to my wheel chair and even more so when Suikotsu came to exercise my legs.

Mother slept on my floor as if I was a child again and was there to administer the pain medicine on schedule and help me move to and from the bathroom.

I didn't want Rin to see me like that, to see me in so much pain.

There's a twenty-something in the car giving us a look that screams, _hurry up._ Rin's mouth opens and then closes, but that doesn't hurt as much as the stream down her cheeks.

"We need to talk." Not giving her the chance to refuse, I pass the driver the last ten in my wallet, thank him for his time and ask him to leave. The entire time she's quiet. "You said you loved me." There's so much I want to say, but I don't know how. She's been my anchor for the last five months, the one who told me I could instead of I couldn't, who convinced me to believe, to dream. "Come with me."

"I want to go home," she sputters out.

"After we talk. Come with me." I pull on her wrist, encouraging her to walk with me.

She is so quiet it makes my heart stop. We go the backway into my garden. The place that I let no one in, except for Kieran. I take her to the apple tree. It's boughs are just beginning to blossom. By the end of the summer she'll yield me enough apples to feed myself, Inuyasha's family and Rin's. "Did you mean what you said?"

"Of course I meant it. I love you Sesshomaru," she can barely speak for the shaking of her shoulders. "I love you and you pushed me away."

I press my forehead against hers, trying to calm her, holding her close to my heart, so lost in how she smells, the way the wind whips her hair and in the warmth she gives me. She sees me, the real me and accepts who I am. What's more, is that unlike the others I have been around, she is content for me to be who I am. Give or take making me try new things, helping me make friends and being so much of what I need. "I love you. I have for a while now."

Her head snaps up, our eyes meet.

"I should have said it sooner. I love you." Our lips meet again, making me feel like we are flying, soaring through the air together. She holds me around the waist, scraping her teeth against mine.

"I love you," she whispers, my heart soars.

"How were you twenty five and still a virgin? I thought you and Shippo—"

"Just fingers and apparently not enough at once," she chuckles, the tears finally stopping. "Bya liked head, but he didn't do what you did and before that, it's complicated. I went to college at fifteen. Jailbait and grad school I was too busy."

"I'm flattered then, that you would want to love a cripple."

"You're not a cripple. Not to me anyway." She kisses my neck, and settles in my arms. "Do you still want to coach me?"

"If you'll have me. Forgive me." I kiss the joint of her neck and then her lips again. A part of me still wonders, what happens when she sees the worst?

"Stop shutting me out? Please?" She kisses my mouth.

"Rin, you don't know what it's like."

"Then show me. Let me be with you. I'm not going to abandon you just because things get hard."

She says that now. I want this. I want to be with Rin like this, in my garden to give her what she's given me. I can feel the brush of the wind against the part of my toe I can feel. "Take a shower with me?" I offer, taking a marshmallow out of her hair.

There's something sensuous about lathering a female body. They have curves in all the right spots. We're under a spray of hot water. I lather her back, her shoulders and then cup her breasts in both hands while kissing her neck. I want her again. She moans when my tongue slides up her neck and I suck on her pulse feeding off her warmth. She arches, baring her breasts, plump pink nipples that slide between my thumb and index finger. The next moan comes out as a whine. She brings my hand down between her legs, sliding further back in my embrace. "Touch me?"

I do. I find her clit and rub it in circular motions. Each time it's tugged up, she jumps in my lap. My fingers slide up and down her slit, memorizing the feel of her opening, the way her petals fold. I reach lower, searching for myself, deflated to find that although I am aroused, it's soggy. Suddenly I want to escape this sensuous moment.

"What's wrong?"

The last time I couldn't perform, I lost the love of my life, but Rin's so different.

She reaches down and when her hand comes back out, I know she's discovered what I did. "It's okay. Do you want me touch your stomach again?"

"I'll take care of you first." My hand glides up her thighs. She sets her heels on either side of my legs, baring her womanhood to me. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," she says confidently. "I'm just glad to be with you—uh…" I've found where she likes it.

The shower becomes quiet, while I learn the topography of her intimate parts. I find where she likes it the most, where to put the most pressure, that she bulges in the front the more aroused she gets and when she orgasms, she digs her nails into my shoulders and humps by hand. "Ow," she whispers at the end.

My hand retracts automatically and she goes limp in my arms. "I love you so much," I tell her.

"I love you. I'm so glad you felt something." Lazily she slides off my lap and spreads my legs, nipping and kissing my stomach. I can feel the heat boiling inside of me and the pressure building. Her tongue slides lower and lower, tickling where I can feel and not. Each time she comes up above my navel I groan in pleasure. Holding her head, I direct her mouth. A part of me wants her to take me in her mouth, but I won't feel it.

She kisses and sucks and then leans back, letting me watch her rub my shaft with her hand. I groan and sigh gripping the sides of the shower bench that's built into the wall. I can't feel her hand, but my mind can, and it fires over and over again until the water washes away my spray. I never thought I would be able to come again.

"Stay the night?" I don't want her to leave. I want to live in this moment.

The ice cream is soup by the time we leave the shower. She dresses in one of my undershirts that barely covers her bottom. We change the sheets and clean the mess of leftover rocky road. For the first time in years, embarrassment doesn't wash through me when I put a new waterproof liner on, or the chux pads I sleep with to keep the bed clean.

We collect tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, lettuce and peppers to make a salad in the kitchen and grill chicken, then curl up and watch movies in bed. At some point mother knocks on the door, asking if we saved anything for her. Rin shrieks in humiliation because she is wearing nothing underneath my white T-shirt and the cheeks of her bottom peek out from the hem.

Nonetheless I feed mother and send her off. "Is she still sober?"

"Shocking right? She's turned over a new leaf. She's been sober since she left in December. Despite the sleepless nights after the surgery, she turned to root beer instead."

Rin chuckles and then yawns widely. "I got my new boots. They're broken in now. No more bruises. I'm so tired." She hangs on me, so warm and so tight.

"You can sleep." I comb my fingers through her wet hair.

She cuddles into my side, resting her chin on my chest, closing her eyes and mumbles, "Can we sleep naked?"

"Naked?"

"Call me childish. I always had this dream that after I made love the first time, we'd snuggle in bed and sleep naked together. Please?"

"As you wish." I can't remember the last time I smiled so much. She removes the t-shirt, nervously moving closer to me. I take my pants off and my tank top.

"How…how do you sleep? I want you to be comfortable."

"On my sides."

"Okay."

"You can fall asleep how you want. I'll get comfortable after."

And she does, curled against my chest, muttering about how warm my skin is. She kisses my pec then passes out, snoring in no time. Just like that, I'm no longer alone.

I gaze at this woman in bed with me, wondering how I am so lucky. When you've lost the one you loved before from a life altering injuring, there is something so much more meaningful about the one who stays with you in spite of it. As the night moves on, she rolls onto her other side, making it easier for me to pull my legs into a comfortable position and fall asleep. I hold her around the waist, smelling her hair, her neck and taste her skin one last time before peacefully falling asleep.

Several hours later, we're both startled awake by her phone ringing. She reaches for it, while my eyes adjust and silences it. But then it rings again, almost a persistent nagging at my ears until she answers. "Hak?"

I can't hear what is said on the other end. She's a mess of black hair, falling down the side of her naked body. I sit up, massaging her shoulders and kissing her neck. I want her back down next to me, folded against my chest.

"I'm fine. What time is it? That late huh…yes I'm with Sesshomaru." We share a smile that says more than words can. "That is none of your business! I did not…maybe I did…I'm not answering these questions, it's two in the morning and we were sleeping! I'll be home in the morning. Love you, bye." She turns to me, and butt-snuggles her way back into my chest. "Sorry. Worried brother."

"It's okay," I mutter into her hair and the world goes black again. God, it feels good to have someone in my arms again.

Early in the morning, her alarm goes off. I want to ignore it, but I feel moisture on my middle, and immediately I know, paralysis has struck again. Fuck and it's not just on me. Gritting my teeth, I pull myself out of bed, quickly transferring to the chair and pulling the sheet off. I can't hide what happened.

"What's going on?" she asks me, but then she notices the moisture on her legs and waist. "Oh…"

"Fuck." If screaming would help, I would, but it doesn't. The sheets need to be changed, but more importantly I need to clean myself and cath whatever is left so I don't end up doing this again. This is what I feared would happen if I let her this close.

"It's okay," she tries to tell me.

Ignoring it, I go into the bathroom and take out a disposable catheter. Once I know I am empty, I go back into the shower and bury my head in my hands. This is humiliating and the hardest part is that I know at any moment, just like Kagura, Rin is going to realize this is too much.

The door opens. Rin joins me, increasing my humiliation. Doesn't she see it? "What are you doing in here?" It comes out so cold and callous that even I am shocked.

"Taking a shower." She twists around in the water, sluicing water over her curves. "I changed the bedding."

"Why would you do that?"

"Why are you so upset?"

"I didn't ask you to do that!"

"I didn't know you had to ask! Why are you yelling at me?" Her face falls, spiderwebs of red pain for in her eyes.

"Because I don't need your help!"

"Fine, you don't need my help." She steps out of the shower, nearly tripping on the lip, slamming the door behind her.

I slam a fist into the wall and immediately regret it. My knuckles ache and two of them immediately begin bleeding.

She storms back through the door, with tears streaming down her face. "You are such an idiot! You are going to push away the only good thing that has happened to you since you were hurt, all for your pride. You selfish, arrogant jerk!" She slams the door again.

After turning the water off, I hear her crying and a flurry of activity on the other side of the door.

Rin who has stood by my side, who acted like this accident was nothing. The same woman who asked me to coach her and spent so much time worrying about me while I was in the hospital.

"Rin!" I yell, grabbing my chair. Ignoring the fact that I nearly slip out of the chair, and lose my grip on the handles from the moisture. "Rin wait!"

A muffled yell makes its way through the door that sounds more like a protest. "Rin I can't chase you! Please!" My voice echoes off the walls of the bathroom. I adjust my posture so I don't fall out of it and open the door, catching her just as she is going for the hall. "Rin, I'm begging you, please…don't leave."

"I have to get to the rink," she refuses to look at me while she speaks.

"I'm sorry," I whisper, holding her wrist, so naked and vulnerable. "Please, Rin. Don't leave."

"I," she breaks, covering her eyes with her free hand and then turns to me, crawling into my lap. She holds my neck and sobs into my cheek. "Don't you get it? I don't care you are in this chair, or if it makes things harder. I love you…" she coughs and cries harder. "I promised when I made love, really made love it would be because I am in love." She shivers and shakes so hard, I break too. "I love you, you idiot!"

Tears slither their way down my cheeks to my chin and it finally hits me. She grew up in a home where love was the constant language, despite the pain she has experienced losing her mother and her aunt. "I…" It's so hard to speak. "I'm not used to having someone with me. Someone who wants to see this."

"I see you, isn't that enough?"

"It's not about seeing me. I couldn't lay on top of you last night to make love to you. I can't hold you in my arms standing up. You will always look down on me—"

"It doesn't matter! If it did, why would I be here. I fell in love with you for you, not because of the surgery you had, or because of the gold medals, or because I feel bad for you. I love you. Please don't push me away."

"I'm sorry." Our tears mingle against our cheeks. "Shh," I try to quiet her, feeling like shit but she only cries harder and harder until her back wracks with coughs and she struggles to breathe. "Hey." Lifting her chin, I kiss her lips. "Calm down."

"P-p-panic," she sputters out, gripping me tighter.

"Do you have medicine?"

"At home."

Great, now I've thrown the woman I love into a mess of anxiety and panic. "I have something for it. Do you want to take it?"

"Just hold me," she whispers and we wait for it to subside. I hold her the entire time, rubbing her back and whispering in her ears. For her part, she closes her eyes and breathes deeply, focused. During those moments, it becomes clear to me why she is reacting like this. They took in Shippo a lost soul and me. When they love, it comes from deep within the heart and encompasses everything. It doesn't matter that we aren't married, that we've never even dated, just that we are.

She pulls away from me. "I'm sorry…I haven't had one in a while."

"I'm so sorry," I whisper to her, kissing her mouth. "I haven't had anyone with me for so long."

"I'm here now. I have been. Please, let me into your world. You're not alone anymore."

Years ago, I thought I had no tears to left to cry. Nothing left to feel, until she said those words and the dam inside me breaks. I bury my face in her neck and shed four years of loneliness into her skin, four years of sorrow, four years asking, will anyone love me like this. "God, I love you."

We're late to the rink in the morning, getting there at six thirty instead of six. This time I was able to drive, thanks to having a licensed driver in the car.

Mother cast us a glance that said she heard what we were doing the night before. Her cheeks were red and eyes glinting in the sunlight. But however red her cheeks were, Rin's were an even dark shade.

The Honda Kicks is a spacious car. It's factory painted, dark grey with an orange sunroof, equipped with my handicap placard so I can park where I have plenty of room to get in and out of my car. "You've gotten good at this," Rin said to me as we drove to the rink.

"It only took a few weeks."

She starts chuckling softly at first and then much harder. "What are you laughing at?"

"Nothing…just that for once you had to struggle at something to get it right. It's not that hard to drive a car."

I would have reached to the side of the car and goosed her side, but I was too busy watching the road, and I don't have the freedom of a spare hand when I drive. Not unless I grow a third one.

Rin gets out and brings me the wheel chair from the trunk. I don't argue when she puts it together for me. Thanks to that row this morning over the sheets, I've learned that she wants to help, to feel like she is giving me her support. On the ride here, I decided that we'll both need time to figure out this relationship. Before we go in, I pull her into a passionate kiss, tasting coffee and cinnamon on her lips. "Mmh," she whimpers against me. "You made me sore."

"I said go slowly. You're the one that slammed it in. I was an innocent bystander."

"So innocent, you sat there and took it."

"I'd take it again," but then I pause and remember, "we didn't use a condom."

"Worried you're going to get me pregnant?"

"Now wouldn't be the best time."

"Then lucky for you I'm on birth control. I got the Mirena when Bya and I were going hot and heavy." She kisses me again. "I love you."

There's something about hearing those words as she clings to my shoulders. About knowing that she feels so strongly about me and most likely has for some time. "I love you." We kiss again. "It's getting cold. We should go inside."

She soars like an angel now on the ice, smooth, delicate, yet strong and supple at the same time. In my absence, she decided on using the music from the Last Samurai for the long program and Habanera by Charlotte Church for the short program.

She starts in the center of the ice and breaks out into something that resembles a rumba with more complicated steps and then sets up the first pass. The combined jumps would tally her up to 15 points, a strong start to the program.

Her feet twirl and circle on the ice until she throws herself into a camel spin with one leg out, then forward into a sit spin and rising into beautiful layback spin I nearly get dizzy watching.

And then it ends with her panting and catching her breath. "How was it?"

"Nearly perfect," I answer. "You wobbled on the jumps and traveled on the sit spin."

"How bad?" She skates up to me with a horrified expression on her face.

"Bad enough you'd lose points. You're rushing them. The movements need to be fluid, like in ballet." I raise my arms from side to side, "slowly raise your arms, and gradually draw your arms in. You're momentum is happening faster than you can control."

She smirks at me with her hands on her hips. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't already feeling aroused watching her skate on the ice and coming up with kinky fantasies of how we could make love against the back wall. Or if I could stand, take her from behind with one leg up, except it's been so long since I've been able to feel stimulation on myself that I forgot what sex actually feels like in my old body. In this one it's new and different and in some ways more sensual because I must rely on input from other parts of my body.

"Hello, are you listening to me?"

"Mmh?"

"What were you thinking about?" She comes closer and leans over my chair, grasping the handles. She kisses my lips, forcing the chair back until it hits the wall of the rink. She slides onto my lap and holds my shoulders. Our teeth scrape against each other, fingers twining in hair.

She rocks against me, bumping into my stomach, making me gasp. I slide my hands down her leggings, into her underwear, but she catches my hand. "It's still sore."

"I'll be gentle," I encourage her and slide down her slit. She may be sore, but she's wet against my hand. The moment my fingers brush against her clit, she rocks forward moaning.

"Ahem!" a rough voice clears on the other side of the ice. Moving my head from the forest of hair surrounding me, still cupping Rin's neck, I find Kaede on the rink cover the eyes of two of her younger skaters.

"We have company." I slide my hand out of her pants and wipe it on my leg. "And you have a long program to show me."

She goes back to the center of the rink. I use the remote controls to cue the music. Starting in a Tai Chi position with her arms upraised and both toes resting on toe picks, the music begins. In the end she decided to space the jumps and only add more in the end if it's needed to bump her score up.

She floats gracefully across the ice, tip toeing and twisting and then flying in a perfect camel. "She's getting better."

"Is she near where she was before?"

"Not quite. Her confidence still needs to come back. That's one of the joys of being young Sesshomaru. You never know how amazing you are until you aren't and you've hurt yourself. She'll get there."

Jakotsu picks Rin up at eight to go to work. I am left by myself on the ice. I spend an extra hour watching Kaede with her skaters, studying their moves, techniques, jumps, spins and footwork to rank them next to Rin. When my notes are taken and packed away, I text my father to come get me, or rather be my designated driver.

I feel like a teenager again. I was fifteen when I got my learners permit. Because my parents had joint custody of me, they both had to agree. Father thought I was too young and reckless whereas mother had taught me to drive when I was twelve so we could covertly get to and from practice on days when she was in a bender.

I was looking forward to owning my own car, the final nail in my secret plan to seek out emancipation.

I waited not so patiently until I was sixteen and knew that I had a substantial amount of money saved in my checking account to pay the legal fees. Mother's drinking was at an all-time high and as colleges would soon be knocking on my door, father wanted me to train less and focus more on academics. I had a C average and only did well in classes that didn't involve reading and writing. Things I didn't have time for.

Here's a fun fact when it comes to money and athletes. Yes we are paid large sums of money to compete and also spend large sums of money to maintain coaches, gym memberships, physical therapists, nutritionists and by the time we're done it's the sponsors that we need to help pay our fees. Behind that our parents are become the gate keepers to our money. But because they are raising us, a certain amount of funds is available to them, for the burden of raising an athlete of course.

But no one talks about what happens when your mother is an alcoholic. More than once I had to turn to my father's legal expertise to file injunctions to protect my money until I was eighteen or emancipated.

As soon as sixteen came, I went to the courts and asked to be free of both of them. Mother was a drunk that spent more of my money on alcohol than food and father didn't support my aspirations. The guardian ad litem in the end sided with me and I was financially free of both my parents and legally able to make my own choices. It meant I could train harder and for longer hours and I no longer had to fight my father for permission to compete abroad and go on the grand prix circuits.

What they took as betrayal became my freedom.

"The car looks good," Dad says as we get in.

"There's screws on the wheels is where you can take them off," I demonstrate. Being that he was never around, he's never had to help take the wheels off and fold the chair so it can fit inside the car. He pops the second wheel off and slides it into the rather spacious trunk and then we drive to my appointment the neurosurgeon.

"When are you taking the driver's exam?" he asks, cordially, but at least he's here, making an effort.

"In a few days I hope."

"You felt something? You really felt something?" His face swells with hope, eyes glistening, making the air between warmer.

"My toes."

"I'm so proud of you Sesshomaru," he says. The air between us electrictrifies. My father finally feels pride in me.

The morning is spent waiting in chairs. Every fifteen minutes, Rin texts me to see if I'm alright, or if I'm bored. We begin a round of guess who and guess what, while the doctor takes his time. Dad stays, trying to show some solidarity but running a company means that he's constantly by the window's on his phone and I'm reminded of being a boy so desperate for his attention waiting for him to get off.

Two hours later, my name is called. Dad waits outside the door while they do the typical weigh in, chair and all and check my vitals. When we're done, we're put into another room where we wait. I roll to the exam table, and lift myself out of the chair, grateful that my muscles have healed so quickly and it no longer twinges. "Is it hard doing that?"

"It gets easier with practice. Try it." I point at my chair. "No legs, just arms and core."

Dad sits down gingerly and nervously, attempting to maneuver to a comfortable position to lift himself. First he tries head on but then realizes if you have to slide onto a surface and that surface is 180 degrees from your ass it's not a good position to be in. He backs the wheel chair up, and tries that way, but can't his heels get caught on the seat of the chair. "Sideways," I tell him.

He reaches for the bench and lifts himself up next to me, sloppily sliding his ass onto the table. It's like I can see his mind comprehending why I do things how I do.

Dr. Hazan enters with Okinawa. They ask me to remove my shirt, socks and shoes so they can check the sensation on my stomach.

I lay down on the table, feeling bare and rather vulnerable. My phone buzzes again. It's Rin, texting me a picture of herself with her hands held in a heart. Love…it makes me wonder what we are now. More than friends, more than a coach and his skater. Making love has never felt like that, desperate, emotional, the biggest relief of tension and warmth I've ever felt.

"You felt sensation in your feet?"

"My toes, in the webbing and at the top of the balls of my feet."

They run pens along the base of my toes. I can feel it tickle, but I can't move away from it. "Have you tried moving your toes?" Dr. Okinawa asks.

"Not yet." Although I spent half the night petting them, making sure they were real and I wasn't imagining things.

"Let's see if you can. Just focus on your feet," Dr. Hazan tells me.

Dad comes closer, watching my toes. Taking a deep breath, I sit up, supporting my weight with my palms against the table. I imagine my brain is connected to them, that I can feel from my head down to my hips, my legs, my calves and my feet. In my mind, I'm moving the large toe to the side, the way it had in the reflect but each time I try, my mind speaks and my body refuses. I groan in frustration and the doctors shake their heads. "More time. How much of your stomach can you feel now?"

I lay back down while they slide the back of a pen down my stomach. "Tell me when you can no longer feel it," Dr. Hazan tells me.

It slides from my rib where I can feel it, down my stomach, to my navel where I can't feel but this time it's like a faint brush. "Barely. Now nothing." I glance down, to see where he stopped. It's the same as it was before.

"All good signs," Dr. Hazan says smiling. "I estimate in six months you'll have full sensation back and then it's up to how hard you work in therapy to get back on your feet."

I'm grinning because it worked. My father shakes their hands and thanks them for taking the time to help me. They thank him for making a large donation to the hospital, making me cast him a sidelong look. "Any other changes?" Dr. Okinawa asks.

I glance between my legs, still shocked that I was able to come. Then I shift uncomfortably, wondering if it's proper to say in front of one's father that I made love last night. Clearing my throat, I answer quietly, "I was able to," I clear it again, not wanting to say this in front of my father, but he wants to be here, to be part of what's going on. "I ejaculated."

Dad's head snaps up and turns crimson.

"When was this?" Dr. Okinawa asks.

"Last night."

"Lucky boy, who's the lovely lady?" Dr. Hazan asks. "Girlfriend?"

"Girlfriend."

"Well, she's a lucky girl and you're lucky she's with you. I'd like you to come back in two months and again please call if any more sensation returns. Thank you again Mr. Takahashi." Both doctors shake his hand warmly.

"What did you do?"

"A large donation to neuro-research. This program to help others like you."

"You know money isn't going to fix what happened between us," I remind him, sitting up and putting my clothing back on. I slide off the table and back to the chair, yawning, still exhausted.

"Where to now?"

"Inuyasha's."

"What do you do at your brother's this early?"

"Sleep."

"That's it?"

"If you didn't notice dad, it's a lot of work to propel this chair and I have to get up at five in the morning to coach my skater and then I have two hours of physical and occupational therapy and another two hours at the rink this evening—"

"And a girlfriend." Now he's smiling. "You know the best part about being a parent Sesshomaru? When you see someone love your child as much as you do."

"Wake up, Uncle Shosho!" Kieran calls me from his crib.

My eyes flutter, slowly waking up and focusing on the ceiling. We hung mobiles when he was a baby. There's one with airplanes, another with Ninja Turtles and even competition photos. I focus on my floor routine, raising my trunk off the ground with my arms and splitting my legs wide to the side. "Uncle Shosho flips!" Kieran giggles, throwing his bear in the air.

"Uncle Shosho used to flip," I mutter, rubbing my eyes. I glance at my watch, groaning. It's late in the afternoon, almost three o'clock which means I'll be late today.

Getting out of bed, I straighten my clothes and then pull Kieran out of his bed. I take him directly to his mother who is sitting at the couch drinking coffee, nose buried in a book on nursing practices. "I don't have time to change him."

"I tried waking you," she says as she takes Kieran out of my lap. "You were passed out. Rough night?"

"Not at all. Rin came over yesterday."

She whistles a cat call and smiles. "I thought you were switching to Wind?"

"So did I."

"Keep this up and you aren't going to have a place to go that doesn't have someone with a broken heart," she chuckles and starts changing my nephew.

"He's nearly three. You should train him already."

"Have fun Sesshomaru," Kagome laughs me off.

She's walking tender when she meets me at the door. It's snowing again, making my hands slip along the handle of my wheels. I had in home help the entire time I was drifting in the sea of self-pity. I convinced myself that it was best that Rin not see me at my worst.

But then the sensation didn't come at six weeks, or seven and I began to wonder if once again I wasted my time and if I would be trapped in this decrepit body that doesn't work. It was easier not to face Rin, not to face the world and bare my humiliation. I had hoped that Rin would just let me go, move on and find someone else. Hoped but there was a part of me that also hoped she would do exactly as she did and come to me.

I slide into Band of Seven and start removing my coat, hat, gloves and scarf. Rin comes walking over to me and takes my things. "Hey big guy," she says, kissing my cheek. "Did you have a good sleep?"

"Very."

"What'd the doctor say?"

"That I'm responding the way they hoped. In another six months I may be able to have full sensation back. Only time will tell."

"You've got some sensation back," she teases me. "I've got to get back to my clients. I love you."

The words bring a smile warmly to my lips. "Still sore?" I slide my hand between her legs, up the back of her scrubs making her jump to get away from me.

"Sesshomaru!"

"Put your rod in her cylinder last night?" Jakotsu chuckles as I slide out of my chair onto the floor.

"Jak!" Rin fumes. She's busy helping Danny adjust his leg braces.

I've never taken the time to notice them before. They wrap around his ankles, up his knees, hips and stomach. "Suikotsu," I call him over while I stretch my back on a bosu ball. It helps extend my spine and support my back while I build my abdominal muscles.

"Yes?" he squats down next to me.

"The braces. Should I expect that in my future?"

He purses his lips as if thinking. "Possibly. It depends on how the muscles are built. Most likely if we can get you back on your feet, it will start with waist high and then slowly lowering them until who knows, one day you may not need them."

One day…

"For now, come with me. We're going to practice reminding your legs what it's like to have weight on them."

"Oh god not the harness." I hate the harness. It wraps around my pelvis and stomach like an infant in a jumping toy allowing me to dangle.

"If you want to heal Sesshomaru it's necessary to remind your nerves what they're meant to do."

Growling, I pull myself back into my chair and follow him to the harness. "You're going to look like you're wearing a diaper," Danny giggles contemptuously.

"Hush," Rin warns him, taking his braces off to work on his leg movements on the ground. "You're going to embarrass him."

"So? Everyone makes fun of me!" Danny protests.

I stop next to Danny. "That's because they're idiots."

"No they're not. Ricky James is the smartest boy in my class."

I hate bullies. It's why I pushed my parents to let me homeschool rather than deal with non-athletes. Because I was in ballet they threw homophobic slurs at me. When I started bringing home medals, they were jealous and teased when I was cautious on the playground. If I was going to injure myself it was going to be throwing a pike of the horizontal bar not dislocating a shoulder playing football. "You know what? Do you have a phone at school?"

"I'm eight."

"Do your parents have a phone?"

"Yes."

"Good." Reaching into my shorts, I take my phone out and pull him into a hug. "You tell those idiots at school that you're friends with a three time Olympic champion."

"You went to the Olympics?"

"Three times. Then you tell them I'm giving you one of my gold medals. Tomorrow, I'll remember to bring it. Let them make fun of that."

He throws his arms around my neck, taking me off guard. I can feel his tears his on my neck. I know what it's like to stick out. I wasn't born like this, like he was but I know that feeling of self-consciousness. I too have hidden on the sidelines to avoid the eyes of the men I used to compete against. "Bullying doesn't last forever Danny, I promise."

By the time I'm strung up in the harness, Rin comes into the side room with a sheepish grin on her face. Suikotsu leaves. The door clicks behind him. She waltzes up to me and wraps her arms around my neck. "Did you just lock the door?"

"Yep."

"Isn't that against policy?" She's not so tall like this. The top of her head goes just below my nose. She slides it up, embracing my lips with her own.

"Probably. But I wanted you to experience what it felt like to stand up."

"So this does nothing for my legs?"

"Not really. I just asked Sui to hook you up so I could make out with you standing up."

"You are something else, Rin Matthews." Our lips touch again, slow and steady.


	23. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sesshomaru and Rin bond with their new closeness and competition day draws near.

**Rin**

Winter air blasts against my skin, a sweet relief to the heat inside Band of Seven. The elderly patients always say it's too hot, the younger ones that it's too cold, but it isn't the shock of cold air that has me sweating as I start my walk home. It's the man in the wheelchair a block down. His eyes are on fire, glowing like pools of bubbling honey. That ache between my legs comes.

He licks his lips making my underwear wet. I jog up to him and kiss his lips. They're hot and dry all at once and burn my skin. I want more. I'm panting from the kiss alone. "Come home with me?"

"I was already planning on that." He leads the way, propelling himself so quickly I almost have to jog to keep up with him. "We'll go to the rink after."

He grabs my wrist and yanks me into his lap. He's poking my thighs already. I grip the armrests to keep myself on, breathing heavily. He stops at a crosswalk while the light is red. His hand slides up my thighs, resting just below where I'm burning. "Is there a problem," he speaks huskily in my ear and presses his mouth against my neck. His tongue slithers against my skin. I have to bite my own to stop myself from moaning. It hurts, I need him.

"N…n…no problem."

He squeezes my thigh, making my legs tense, which makes the fire that much hotter. "You're sure." He presses a finger against my crotch almost making me want to get off his lap.

"Says the guy with a pipe in his pants."

He chuckles against my skin, kissing my neck again as the light changes. I feel naked without his lips. He propels us across the street at lightning speed and then around the corner to the entrance of my apartment. I try to get off, but he wraps an arm around my waist. "Stay seated, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times." Then a bump in the road forces his shaft into my thighs making me squeak.

"You're going to get it." I slap the automatic door button. My nipples are so hard, I feel like I'm burning from the inside out.

"Mmh, that's what I'm hoping for." There is a couple with children in the elevator with us. I try to ignore the way they are staring at him and me, who is just sitting in his lap. I try not to groan in pleasure as he runs his fingers up and down my back through my scrubs. The door opens on the second floor first letting the family out. The door closes and we are finally alone, he tilts my neck back into his lips, sucking them, heating them.

His finger dips into my crotch, pressing the fabric of my pants against my clit and this time I do moan. His tongue dances across my lips, dipping into my mouth. The other hand rises up my stomach to grip my left breast. We break apart as soon as the doors open. "Oh God…I think Kohaku is off today."

"I don't see how that's a problem." He finally lets me off his lap. He follows me in after I open the door.

"Kohaku?" I call already heading to my bedroom. But then I pause. Sesshomaru is stuck trying to maneuver around my living room that is not set up for someone in a wheel chair. "Kohaku?!" I exhale in relief and run back to the coffee table, shoving it against the wall so he can get through.

I pounce on him, straddling his lap nearly making the wheel chair fall backwards. Our lips fly against each other as he heads for my bedroom. "Do you have a condom?" I kiss and tongue his mouth, rocking my hips against his shaft. "I want you."

He rolls into my room, pushing me off his lap onto the foot of the bed. I try to move up to the head but he snatches my ankle stopping me. "Come to the foot of the bed." He rips his t-shirt and undershirt off. God, I want to die staring at his abs. He really has come a long way in the six months. They're lined now. His arms are ripped with muscles. He reaches for my feet removing my shoes and then my socks tossing them over his shoulder.

He comes up, nipping at the fabric of my shirt, clamping down on my left nipple, then my right, then sucking on my neck. He pushes me onto my back and grabs my panties and pants pulling them down my legs and onto the ground. I feel exposed as he positions himself between my legs. With back bent, breathing against my slit, he makes my curls blow with his breath. He runs his hands from my knees up to my thighs, so close and then massages the sides of my groin muscles, making me rock my hips against the pressure. "You're such a tease."

"You're such a beauty." He kisses my lower lips and then it begins. I feel his fingers brushing their knuckles first making me grip the bedsheets.

"Oh god…oh…" I can feel the small sting of his teeth each time he pulls me in. The heat has become a blaze I can't escape. "It's so hot." I lift and stretch my legs, bringing my knees to my chest to sweeten the sensation. I can feel my walls searching for something to grip. They clamp down, seeking satisfaction. One hand slides under my shirt, under my bra and massages my nipple and oh I want something…I need something. "Sesshomaru?"

"What?" He comes out of my curls, his lips painted with my moisture.

I sit up panting, holding onto his wrist. "I want…"

He smiles as if he knows and wheels backwards to the side of the bed. "We're going to try a new position."

"Can't you just finger me?" I throw my shirt off and undo my bra. When I look up again, his pants are off, his flag is waving and he uses the headboard and mattress to lift himself out of his chair. He gathers pillows to support his back and then motions me to him. While I crawl across the bed, he opens a condom and slides it over his tip.

I go to straddle him facing him. "No," he takes my hands, "turn around. And go down slowly this time."

I face away from him nervously, trying to figure out how to make this position work. I end up squatting, letting him fill me. It still feels like he is stretching me and so deep. I lean against his chest panting into his neck, while one of his hands cups my breast and the other reaches down and starts running circles on my clit. I see the light. "Come," he whispers, then his lips are on mine again. Like this, I'm spread so wide for him, but it's me that has to make the momentum. I grind my hips against his while he makes friction on my clit and the moans start coming. He's grunting and groaning and god…I can feel it in my belly first, then an ache builds deep where he keeps pressing inside of me.

The fire burns, everything hardens. He's huffing against my neck. He can feel it, at least more than the last time we did this. "Harder Rin, fuck me."

I slam my hips against his, just as his finger races back and forth on my clit. I cry in release, moaning, nearly screaming. I flop back against his chest, sweating and out of breath, still shaking. "Oh my god." I say and kiss his lips, slowly. "I can still feel it."

His finger continues to run lazy circles around my clit, making me clench against him. "You don't have to keep going."

"It's okay," he kisses my neck, right below my ears. "I want you to feel satisfied."

The pulsing is fading. I hold his wrist. "I love you," I say quietly.

His face softens. "I love you."

I slide off his lap and take the condom off to throw in the trash. "Want a wash cloth?"

"Just you." He grabs my wrist and pulls me against his side, still breathing hard.

He's warm and comforting. The same as he was last night. I've never slept so peacefully before. We come together like two pieces of a puzzle, folding in to each other. Yawning into his shoulder, I inhale his skin. He smells like sweat and winter. "We should go to the rink."

"You're exhausted," he whispers, rubbing my cheekbone and the lines under my eyes.

"I haven't been sleeping well. I swear I'm getting more nervous by the minute. Every day passes is one day closer to the competition and I'm worried I won't do it well. And I had to do a lot lifting today. I'm so sore."

"Maybe we should take the night off. Come home with me."

"If I'm not here when Hak gets home he'll worry. We're a family of worriers. It's been like that since my mother died. Sango felt so guilty because they never said goodbye. Kohaku shut himself away. It's like we all handled it differently and just came closer together."

"You're lucky,"

"So are you. Your dad is trying Sesshomaru. You know you can't get those years back right?" I catch his gaze and kiss his lips. "Just like we can't get the last two months back. Anger just seeps into your bones and stops you from seeing what you have. He's trying."

"And the pain?" he asks me, voice softening slightly.

"Does it hurt Sesshomaru?" Palming his chest just over his hear, I kiss him again.

"More than you know," he whispers and holds me tightly to him.

The weeks begin to pass quickly. We act like teenagers exploring for the first time. We make love in the supply closet at the rink, in the locker rooms when no one is looking, in the showers at Band of Seven when I'm supposed to be closing the center down and locking up.

I spend more time at his house than at my own because I've become accustomed to the feel of his skin against mine. Every night is spent together, mostly at his house, but at times I convince him to sleep at mine.

Sesshomaru follows through on his promise to Danny and presents him with a gold medal. He lets Danny choose between one for the horizontal bar, the parallel bars, the rings. He tells Danny when he chooses the one for the rings that it was the last one he won before he fell and hurt his back.

It's as if shedding the medal gives him new life and more courage to live.

He passes his driver's exam on the second time around, because the first time he nearly knocked into another car parallel parking. Both times I go with him and when he passes we throw a party at his house and invite both our families.

Kieran, Keaton and Kelsey play together in a box of empty dirt under his apple tree. Miroku works the grill, while Sesshomaru teaches Sango how to garden. The last frost finally fell, making it safe to plant.

Sesshomaru shows her how he erects clear plastic over the newly planted vegetables to keep them from being harmed if another frost falls. Together, with his family we plant his garden, digging deep in the earth. Toga works on the peppers and cucumbers, fending off the bees that flutter around the lavender.

"They're going to ruin whatever you're planning on planting over there," I comment while pulling weeds out of the herb garden.

"No," Sesshomaru replies, planting squash and zucchini, "I made that bed for him to play in. When I bring him here, he tries to uproot anything he can touch. I throw random seeds in there and if he uproots them I don't care. That's Kieran's flower bed."

Kieran covers his mouth chuckling and then kisses Keaton on the lips that she just used to eat dirt. "Did he just kiss my daughter?" Sango gazes on shocked.

"Should we draw up a wedding contract?" Inuyasha laughs, lugging over a large bag of soil to put into an empty bed.

"How do you do this alone?" I ask Sesshomaru.

"I never did completely alone. Mom always helped."

His mother is in charge of bringing the plants from his room to the planting beds. And when she isn't doing that, she's visiting with the playing children. She's brought them candies and keeps them from spreading the mess farther than the bed they're in. "You're going to make a great dad one day." I kiss his cheek and keep working on my task.

In April Jak, Shippo and I go shopping for tutus. I'm armed with my first credit card because these things are about as expensive as my boots and I don't want to dip too deep into my savings account. We find a mother owned shop out in Lakewood and spend the afternoon trying on dresses.

"How do I look in this one?" Jak tries on a dress in forest green with a brown belt, looking something like Robin Hood. "This squeezes the baggage." He does a twirl in front of the mirror, making the skirt fly up revealing his perfectly shaped ass.

"Thinking of competing Jak?" I tease him, coming out of the dressing room with a sea green dress on. It barely covers my ass and crisscrosses my chest with silver sequins. "Wow this flashes a lot of skin."

"You look hot Rin!" Shippo exclaims, wearing a ruffled white top and skin tight black pants. "Remember when I used to skate?"

"Man you should, those pants squeeze your ass in all the right places. You should get kinky with Kanta," Jak tells him.

I do a twirl in front of the mirror, checking out the look with the tights and then do a few tricks on the ground, making sure it's comfortable to move in. "It's a bit tight in the back."

"We can let it out," the sales attendant informs me.

"What do you think? Long or short program?"

"Short," Shippo and Jak say together. "We need something samurai like for the long though. With the music choice it makes more sense."

Nodding, I speak with the clerk and we find a slim red dress that goes just to my hips and comes up to the neck in a Chinese styled shirt. It's sleeveless, which for me is preferable. "Perfect."

"Red's hot. I think Sesshomaru's gonna melt when he sees these," Jak says excited.

Melt he does. He asks me if I got the dresses when we meet at the Rink that night. I show him the pictures. He tells me he will need a personal viewing when they're adjusted, which two weeks later means I fulfill his kinky fantasy of stripping out of one for him.

It ends in making love so loud Kohaku has to invest in ear plugs and begs us to spend the night at Sesshomaru's house so the women he entertains don't get jealous that he isn't making them scream so loud. "Need a few pointers?" Sesshomaru chides him.

"No…yes…maybe…maybe…" and then they secret themselves away in my brother's room and I don't see either of them until dinner time.

May comes, bringing gusts of air so strong they nearly knock me over while I jump out of Jakotsu's car and head for the rink. It's my last practice before the big competition. I can't believe I'm doing this again. That last time when I tried to skate at fifteen, I swore I would never get on the ice again. I swore I wouldn't feel like this again, but the buzz of nerves hits me, making want to give up before I've even started. Buckling under the pressure, I fall on the first pass of jumps landing on my ass.

Pulling myself off the ground, I start circular foot work, feeling like I'm going to fall down from dizziness. "Stop!" Sesshomaru calls and maneuvers himself closer to me. "It's all sloppy."

Groaning, I shift my feet on the ice. "I'm going to fail. I'm not even going to make it through. They're going to laugh…"

"Stop," he takes my hands in his. "Listen to me, we've been over this. You're doing it for fun and you'll see what happens. Neither one of us is going to feel bad if you fail."

"Rin!" Kaede calls me from the lip of the ice. We rented the rink for the next two hours so I can practice alone and not worry about running into someone.

"What?" I call heavily.

"The news station is here. They want to talk to you."

"Great." Kneading my forehead, I skate circles around Sesshomaru.

"You're going to make me throw up," he catches my wrist as he speaks. "Do you remember how to interview?"

"Not really."

"Just remember, simple answers. You don't reveal more than you want and whether you say something or not about our relationship is your choice."

"You think I should talk to them?"

"Sponsors. If you want to take this farther than you need to promote yourself. Imagine it, Olympic hopeful going for a second chance."

"Coached by three time Olympic hottie, Sesshomaru Takahashi." Our lips meet, making me want to drag his ass into the supply closet again.

"Go on. I'll be waiting for you."

"Right."

_"_ _Rin Matthews, twenty five from Denver, Colorado is competing in the Denver Invitational. She's hoping to make a comeback from her 2010 fall just before the Olympics in Vancouver, Canada. Rin Matthews was one of the first females to land a quad in competition. After the fall, Rin fell of the radar and dedicated herself to her studies becoming a college student and last year graduating with PhD in physical therapy."_

_"_ _I'm just doing this for fun."_

_"_ _She was inspired by her then patient now boyfriend and coach Sesshomaru Takahashi. Three time Olympic Champion and one of the most decorated male gymnasts in the world."_

_"_ _The hope is to go out and skate a clean program."_

_"_ _Rin what happens if you qualify for Sectionals?"_

_"_ _We'll see. I have to get into the top four first and I'm skating against people with more recent training and who are ten years younger than me."_

_"_ _Well we wish you luck."_

An eruption of clapping breaks out in Sango and Miroku's living room. I'm spending the night at their house so I feel less like a nervous wreck. "I can't believe they showed that leaked video." There's nothing like seeing yourself go up and come down hard on your knee. You can even hear the bone cracking and the scream.

"Don't let it get to you sis," Kohaku tells me. "You're going to be fine."

"I think I'm going to be sick." I jump off the couch and run into the bathroom heaving everything I ate for dinner. "Great." More comes flying out of my mouth.

Hands gather the hair behind my head, tying it back in a pony tail. "It's okay."

"Thanks Sango." I rinse my mouth out. "What am I doing?"

"What you're good at?" she answers wisely and then sits on the edge of the bathtub. "At some point, you have to let go of the fall."

"I know," I heave out and join her, trying to settle my stomach. "Maybe it was just too much to process then. I felt like I let you and Mir down and mom. She sacrificed so much so I could skate. She was so excited when I got interviewed that one time, remember and they said I was an Olympic hopeful? That night before she died, she said she'd be watching me skate in heaven. What if I mess up? What if I let him down?"

"What if you forgive yourself and just skate your heart out? We both know you love it. You never let us down. We're so proud of you." She hugs me tight, bringing tears to my eyes. "And if you two have sex tonight, do you mind to keep it down?"

My cheeks bloom with color and I shrug. "Sorry…"

"So it's not awkward?" Sango giggles. "Kohaku said you two are constantly at it."

I shrug again. "It feels good and no it's not awkward. It's different. Different than I imagined it but every day he can feel a little more. At least this way we aren't so concerned about finishing quickly."

"I'm glad you're happy. From now on, he comes to the family dinners." She gives me one last squeeze and leaves the bathroom.

"Fine with me."


	24. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Competition day has come. How will Rin faire against the other skaters?

**Sesshomaru**

I wake to the sound of hysterical screaming, crying and a plea to find her mother. She jolts away from my back, where she had slept so peacefully for the last few hours.

Rising up with her, I immediately fumble for the photobook that was left on the night stand and turn the light on. It blinds us both. She hides her eyes in my chest. I hide mine against her neck, shushing her, rocking her as if she's a child again. I reach for the kettle that was left by the lamp and flick it on, then open the photobook in her lap. I have too much pride to sing, "Baby Mine."

Kohaku warned me this might happen. That afternoon I spent closeted in his room, regaling him of the benefits of slowing down in the bedroom to extend to the pleasure of the female, somehow side tracked to Rin's anxiety. It started shortly after Rina died. Rin would wake in sweats, screaming for her mother. At the time, they knew that Henna was sick and were still hopeful she might beat it.

As Henna got worse, Rin feared going to competitions and coming home to find her mother dead. Her mother had to convince her to compete regardless and taught her to put on a brave face.

The night Henna died, Rin fell asleep in her mother arms after listening to a children's story about a child losing their parent. When she woke up, her mother was gone. At twelve she had no idea how to process it. That is when the anxiety took over and to this day, Kohaku had told me, Rin still breaks when the pressure is high. He baked cookies constantly during finals, before competitions. Like clockwork, she would wake hysterical and only calm for chamomile tea, chocolate chip cookies, the photobook and the lullaby her mother used to sing her.

I turn "Baby Mine" on my phone and set it in her lap. We open the sacred photo album, something Henna put together for her before her death and Sango and Kohaku added to afterwards. The room is filled with a tepid silence as her fingers trace the picture of her mother. Rin is a baby in this one. Pudgy hands and carrot covered face, her mother feeds her. In the next she's learning to walk and another getting dropped off at her first day of PreK.

At six, she skates wobbly on the ice with a bright smile on her face. They continue until she's twelve, private moments with her mother that she doesn't explain to me, but with each one the rapid breathing slows, the air becomes less stale and she whimpers less. I hold myself up behind her, warming her back with my body, learning this method of coping she's built to process the pain of losing both her parents. "She was so proud of me," she mutters, wiping her eyes. "She wanted me to go all the away. She told me to never to be afraid of anything. I asked her if she was. She said the only thing she feared was leaving us behind." She covers her mouth, crying anew.

I press my lips into her pulse, willing her to calm, to find comfort in my arms.

The next page is their first Christmas without Henna. They staged it by their mothers' graves. It was not a hidden fact that Sango was listed first to inherit the children. In the letter to the guardian ad litem was a desperate plea to keep the children together, despite them being only cousins and not siblings. Rina had written the same letter for posterity, that theirs was a family built and thriving on love and the bonds they had to each other.

Kohaku had told me that the deciding factor that kept them in Sango's care was both her age and determination and that overnight she and Miroku had wed at a sleazy chapel. He dropped out of college to help financially support children that weren't his.

"Sometimes I forget how quickly Shippo came to us. It wasn't even a year later. Just months. Sango and Miroku were already cleared because of us. And Social workers would rather see a child placed than left behind in most cases." Kohaku had cautioned silence. To let her speak and only listen.

When she gets to the last page, a new picture graces the glossy pockets. It's one of us on the ice, kissing I took when she didn't notice. She's wrapped in my arms, with hands tangled in my hair. A chuckle escapes her tense lips, flinging tears onto the page. "You know what this means right?"

"What?" I answer softly, protecting this hallow moment.

"That no matter what happens between us, no matter the pain we cause each other or the despair, we'll always be family."

"I love you Rin," firmly I tell her, "more than you can imagine."

"I love you," she whimpers in reply and falls against my chest crying. "Promise me you'll love me no matter what happens tomorrow?"

A twinge pain enters my heart, knowing that deep down, she fears rejection, that disappointing me might separate us. "I promise. If you get into the top four, I'll even take you on a first date."

We both break out laughing because although we've been inseparable for four months, we've never been on an official date.

I pick up the tea from the nightstand and hand it to her, then pass her a cookie. She eats it slowly, methodically. When the cup is empty, she sets it down and turns back into my chest, wrapping her arms around my waist. "Who told you?"

"Your brother."

"Thank you."

I lower her back onto the mattress, pulling the blankets over both of us. This time she's tucked into my chest. I pull my knees up against hers and rest an arm around her waist. She falls asleep much faster than when we first laid to rest earlier in the evening.

Kaede was right, her confidence was shot when she broke her knee and although I've seen it come back in practice, it's not the same as performing in front of a crowd.

We wake early in the morning to get to the rink. Rin's slated to skate the short program at 10:15, in the first group of ladies and the long program late in the afternoon. She's quiet while she grabs the bag she packed the night before and gets into the car with me. Sango and Miroku promise to follow, along with her brothers.

There's a decent crowd at the rink. Jak meets us up front, following Rin back to the locker-rooms. He's been helping Rin to stretch and ease her muscles so they heal faster. Whereas I go and make sure that she is registered and obtain her competition number.

After that, I join the other coaches in a lounge while the opening ceremonies begin. My stomach has butterflies, but not nearly as badly as when I used to compete. The coaches would say that it's like building a sand castle. You have to build the foundation before the rooms, and the towers that reach the sky. You have to master one skill before the next. Each time it gets easier because the movements become second nature. Gymnastics for me was like a second language. My body knew what to do even when I forgot.

She comes into the lounge with me, holding her skates with the blade covers on. A nervous look graces her face. Her stomach is bare in this get up making me want to finish what we had started in the morning. I woke hard, with typical morning wood. She teased my sides long enough to make me want more, but we had to get here. "You're going to be fine."

"I threw up again."

Reaching into my pocket, I hand her a snickers.

"Chocolate!" she shrieks and gobbles it down. "Oh my god that was wonderful." She wipes her hands on a napkin and then puts her skates on, lacing them up slowly, and then pulls the thick tights down over her boots.

"Go warm up. Remember to keep your confidence. You know what you're doing. This is just all muscle memory and we're having fun." We kiss briefly, something else we talked about on the way there. In this world PDA isn't frowned on, but it won't look particularly well if her coach is tonguing her during her skate.

She flies out onto the ice with the other five skaters and starts warming up, skating facing forward and then backwards and then starting with several jumps. While she does that, I size up the rest of the competition. She's on the ice with four other skaters and after her are three more groups of five, totaling twenty skaters in all. The top four will be able to go onto sectionals. They're ranked by previous high scores.

Ten of them won't pose much of a challenge if Rin can keep her head in the game, five will give her a run for the money and the other could go either way depending on improvement from last year. Three of the top five have already gone on to sectionals in the past and one of them even made to the grand prix but didn't score high enough for worlds. I make a mental note to keep an eye on Yura Ito. Her season's best last year was 200.68.

Rin passes by me and winks. I told her to throw a triple triple combination during warm up to psych the other players out and get in their heads. Around me I hear rumblings of coaches who remember her name and how she was so much more slender when she was younger and that like this there's no way she can lift high enough until she rushes the backboards and throws herself into high triple axel, ignoring my advice on the combo. The jump alone sends the other skaters reeling.

She comes off the ice as the first skaters are call to their marks. "I said a combo."

"I thought a giant axel would scare them more. That bitch Yura, she's nine years younger than me and called me a has been."

"Has been, never was," the girl comes off the ice.

"You know your season's best is nowhere near what mine was," Rin snaps back.

"And you're skating on a bum knee with a cripple for a coach, coward."

"You b—" Rin starts but I grab her hand and stop her from advancing. "Settle it on the ice," I hiss in her ear.

"Fine," she huffs and follows me off into a prep room where she keeps stretching and pacing to keep her limbs warmed.

Her short skate is fast paced and electric in energy. It starts with her hands over her head and legs crossed, poised like a ballerina and then a shuffle before she races for the front of the rink and throws herself into a triple-double combo. I bite my index finger, because the second was supposed to be a triple and already she'll lose points for the missing rotation.

She throws herself into a series of spins, starting with a sit spin and then rising into a camel spin. The music stops for a second and then starts again. She twirls across the ice, changing edges on the blades and then leaps into the air landing a giant triple axel. "That was always her best jump," Kaede says from next to me. I hadn't even noticed her there. "But that missed combination. The competition is fierce today."

My eyes are glued on my skater. She has another combo we planned to be a triple toe loop-double flip. She lands the first jump clean and buckles on the second, landing on her ass. "Dammit," I mutter out. "She's choking." She comes off the ice, breathing heavily. Avoiding eye contact with me.

It's not that I expected her to be perfect. She was in practice, but the two mistakes will cost her dearly. She rubs her bottom and then sits next to me with a bottle of water waiting for the scores. "The technical scores for Rin Matthews 28.98," she nods, bowing her hands into her palms. I rub her back, reminding her that it's okay. We came to have fun, whatever thoughts of doing better running through my head I keep to myself. "Artistic score 27.66, for a combined score of 56.64." She stands, waving to the crowd and then exists, hauling ass to the prep room.

I follow after, propelling myself her direction and skid to a stop just by the door. "Don't say it. I messed up the jumps."

"I wasn't going to say anything."

"Yes you were, I can see it in your eyes."

"We said we would have fun today," I remind her.

"You're also my coach."

"As your coach, you choked. Your legs were too tight and you tripped on your feet. You went into the spins too quickly and missed a rotation."

"I know," she sulks, sliding down the wall and removing her skates. "We're free for the next five hours."

"No we're not. You want the coach, fine. You choked because you are so afraid of your own success, that you would rather fail than succeed."

"That's not true."

"Then why haven't you been on the ice in ten years Rin?"

She gazes around the room nervously. "Do we have to do this here?"

"Yes here. Where else am I going to get you to confront what's really bothering you? We both know you could have done better than that. You locked up on the combinations, why?"

Her gaze shifts away from me, to the walls and the other skaters scattered around the room. "I don't know."

"That's not true." I push myself closer and lift her chin up, trying to find her face through the caked on makeup and sticky hairspray covering her hair21` .

"Maybe my heyday was ten years ago and that's as good as it's going to get. I'm twenty five now. "

"I was twenty four when I competed last. Age has little to do with. Oksana Chusovitna is in her forties and still doing double back dismounts off the balance beam."

"Maybe I'm not her."

"Maybe you should try," I say more tersely, getting more annoyed by the minute that she is clearly avoiding whatever is going on inside of her head. "Is it your mother?"

"You're being an ass."

"And you're being a child. You asked for the coach, this is the coach. When you're ready to tell me what's going on inside of your head, please do." I start rolling away until I hear her yell after me, "Where are you going?"

"Somewhere else. This is obviously not getting me anywhere."

"Maybe it's fear," she gets up and chases after me. "What if I land in the top four? What then?"

"You'll never know if you don't try Rin and your mother would not be happy looking down to see you choking on purpose. If you're going to mess up at least do it in areas where the points don't matter as much."

She growls at me and stomps her foot. "How do we fix this?"

For the next ninety minutes, we dissect her free skate program, attempting to maximize her points. Not only is she being ranked in this skate but everything rides on coming in the top four. That constant question of what if to me is a clear indicator that she wants more. She yearns for more, to take back what was prematurely stolen from her when she was fifteen.

We find out just before we adjourn to lunch that she ranked in the top six. That means she needs to dethrone two above her to get in. "Sara Asano made it to Sectionals last year but then placed sixth with a total score of 175. Koharu Smith also went to sectionals and placed tenth with a score of 169. If you want to beat them you need to score at least 176, which means you cannot make any mistakes."

"And I should land two triple axels and do a triple jump combo."

"Arms up and preferably nearer to the end. We'll move the triple toe-loop, double toe, double loop to the end and instead perform the two axels in the beginning. Extend the flying camel to compensate for the time and hold the I spin at the end for an extra rotation."

"Okay…I can do this. Yura came in first."

"Don't focus on that. If this is what you want, you just need to get into the top four. Sectionals are in June. That means we have another five months to train. A lot can change in five months."

"Right," she whispers. "I can do this."

Casting a glance left and right, I loop my fingers through her hair and pull her lips against mine. "You can."

She's dead last to skate at the end of the day. Meaning we already know the scores for first through forth, putting more pressure on Rin to perform. She exits, pacing back and forth in the prep room, biting her thumb, while I keep my eye on the last skater. Yura Ito is good. Her jumps are almost flawless. The two behind her are new comers, followed by Sara Asano who holds tight to fourth place after the free skate. "You're up," I tell Rin from the doorway.

She walks up to the ice, taking deep and deliberate breaths. "Sara came in at 177."

"She upped her game, you up yours. There's no way you'll make it into second or third. But you can move up to fourth if you focus and don't make any mistakes."

She nods, smiling at me and then goes out onto the ice. The air is electric with expectation. Her routine is announced. The judges prepare their ipads to rank her performance. I move closer to the edge of the ice, where I can see more clearly.

They've accommodated me by leaving the door open to the rink. Rin gets the lay of the ice once more, circling a few times before she stops in the left center of the ice and takes her pose.

My stomach clenches in anticipation. Knuckles white against the handles of my wheelchair. "You can do it Rin!" Shifting my gaze into the audience, I see her family up front, ready to cheer her on. But then I notice a familiar silver to my left. My father is here, watching her and then waves at me. There's no time to question why he is here, or ask him to leave, which is what I really want.

The music revs up, an overture to the Last Samurai. She starts with slow movements on the inside edges of her skates and then picks up speed to head into her first jump. Instead of the initial combination, we settled for the triple axel and then another one where she was meant to spin.

I nod at her, giving her silent permission to crush this competition.

She bites her lower lip and throws herself into the air, wrapping her arms around her shoulders and then lands on the outer edge. The crowd goes wild, a smile lights up her eyes, she did it. There's more circular footwork leading to the next triple axel. She takes it slow and graceful, sliding like a ballerina and then flings herself into the air and lands again, with poise and balance.

I bite my lower lip, mimicking her. So much is riding on the rest of the program. She takes the jumps in stride, but into the third minute, it's obvious she's beginning to fatigue. She misses a rotation on the camel spin and rushes the dance steps, putting her out of sync with the music. "What are you doing," I mutter to myself.

Then comes the triple pass we discussed, the only way for her scores to be high enough to uproot Sara Asano from fourth. She approaches them quickly, gaining speed and flies into a triple toe loop and to my surprise a triple loop and then a double toe.

I beat my palms together with the cry of the audience. She breaks into the flying camel, tracing an S across the ice, beaming like the sun. At the end she throws herself into a sit spin and then into a forward scratch spin, something else we hadn't planned on. She leans down, grabbing her left leg and pulls it up to her head until she's spinning dizzyingly fast. The leg drops stopping the spin, back in sync with the music and ending the program.

The crowd is on their feet. If I was able to stand already, I would be on my feet too. I clap until my hands are sore. She bows to the audience, to the judges and then comes flying off the ice, into my arms. Our pre-existing accord to keep PDA to minimum goes out the window as her lips press against mine. She sucks my bottom lip, shoving her tongue into my mouth. "You did it."

"I did."

"You improvised."

She pecks my lips and releases me, bringing herself to the bench where we wait for her scores. "I thought we said no PDA."

"I don't care right now." She cozies into my side and buries her eyes, panting against my shoulder. We wait, with baited breath and dry mouths for the scores to be announced. My father once again waves from the stands and holds a thumb up.

"The technical scores for Rin Matthews, 65.66 with artistic score of 55.63, making a total of 121.29 and a combined total of 177.93, putting her in fourth."

"YES!" she shrieks, jumping up and down, throwing herself around my neck and crying. "We did it!"

I rock on my back wheels, waiting for Rin to exit the locker-room. Jak went in with her to help her cool down and stretch her legs. Her family made a reservation at steak house downtown to celebrate. She came in fourth, barely knocking Sara Asano down to fifth, but good enough for what we need. "You did good out there," my father's voice catches me. I fumble and nearly fall backwards in the chair.

Catching myself on the wall, I force the wheels back down. "Why were you here?"

"I missed enough competitions Sesshomaru. I wanted to cheer you both on."

Once again I'm left with a dry mouth, unsure of how to let him in.

"She did great. Fourth seems reasonable for someone with her background."

"She did amazing," I correct him. "She can go to sectionals now and if she can bring that score up we can close the gap between her and the competition."

"You think she has a chance?"

"If it's what she wants. We just need to find professional choreographers and a technical specialist who can help get her scores up. She'll have to devote more time to the ice."

He smiles. It lights up his eyes. "If you need a sponsor."

"We don't need your charity."

"It's good publicity for the firm, Sesshomaru and if you are going to take her further, we both know how much it cost for you to compete."

"How do you know?" I snap back at him, painfully reminded of my mother having to clean the grounds to keep me enrolled.

"Who do you think paid for the life you lived? The gym memberships, the specialty coaches?"

"Mother?"

"No, she came to me begging to pay for Selene Ballard and Jayden Wright and the extra gym time, the tutors so that you could graduate early."

"What?" I'm stunned, incapable of forming speech.

"I may have not liked what you did Sesshomaru, but I paid for it."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Would it have helped? You were keen on hating me then? I thought one day we would sit down and talk about it like men and you would have the balls to forgive me for not being the father you wanted."

"Only after you forgive me for not being the son you wanted."

He squats down in front of me, saving my neck from looking up at him. "I want you to succeed. You're good at this. I saw her fumble in the short, she came back strong. If this is what you want, then I'll support it."

"Why the sudden change?"

"Because this isn't how things are meant to be between parents and children, Sesshomaru. I'm so tired of fighting with you, expecting you to be something you clearly don't want to be. I haven't seen you this happy about anyone or anything since the accident. Let it be my penance."

It's like someone has punched me in the gut and stolen the words from my mouth. How does one go from so much anger to support in a small amount of time? We've spoken briefly over the last few months, shared meals when I wasn't busy with my life. "You really want to start fresh?" I ask him.

"I'm trying, Sesshomaru." His face is haggard, drawn and tired.

"Then come to dinner with us tonight. We're celebrating with her family at Shanahan's steakhouse at seven."

"I'd love to."


	25. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Sesshomaru celebrate her victory and plan what they will do next.

**Rin**

"God Jak," I groan. He's between my legs, pushing hard on my thighs.

"You like that baby? Releasing the tension?"

"Fuck. It's so good." He spreads my thighs wider, until I'm stretched like a rubber band. "Mmmh."

"Honey you are so tight. That man doesn't do enough to loosen you up." He tickles my stomach.

"Having fun?" a deep voice comes from the entrance to the locker room and it suddenly occurs to me that we're in a really bad position. I'm on my back, with Jakotsu between my legs, stretching my thigh muscles and my boyfriend is watching us like we're in a thrall.

"Shit!" Screeching, I roll out from underneath Jak's weight and get up, straightening my clothing. "We…were just…we weren't."

"You may be tight, but not tight enough." Jak slaps my bottom with a towel. "Puddles you do know this is the girls locker room. Females only."

"Then why are you here?" Sesshomaru barks back.

"He's asking why I'm here," Jak laughs it off and packs up his supply of salves that he's spent the last twenty minutes rubbing all over me. I smell like a citronella candle. "Listen you come see me at Band in the morning and we'll stretch again. Get you nice and limber. Ban wants to know if you're going to go to sectionals. Dare I even ask?"

"You don't have to ask," I answer him, approaching Sesshomaru. Our lips meet, tongues dancing and hands grabbing at each other greedily. "Hey."

"Hey yourself."

"Hello!" Jak waves a hand in front of us. "There are children in here."

"At least they'll know how they were born," I pipe back at him. "I'm done. Let's go home so I can freshen up for dinner."

"Who's home, mine our yours?" he asks me.

"Who's indeed?" Jak folds his hands over his chest and swaggers his ass. "You two might as well be married already, acting like an old couple making out for everyone to see."

"Jealous?" Sesshomaru crooks his head to the side.

"Nope, I got me a boyfriend at home waiting."

By freshen up, what I really meant was strip Sesshomaru down to nothing and play a game that's become our norm since we made love that afternoon so many months ago. Pulling his shirt over his head, and then yanking his tank top off, I start at his neck, licking, sucking, pulling on his skin. The goal is for him to keep his hands down while I play and toy with him.

His pecs are still one of the most sensitive areas of his body and why I suck hard on the tip, grinning when he groans loudly. He's twitching already. Taking it further, my hands run up and down his sides, making his breath catch, then across his abs and to that sweet spot just above his navel that turns the twitching into a rod in his pants.

Now the fun part. Every day, he's been able to feel more and more…south. At this rate, in a few months, I'll bless him with a blow job. I did once but it was more for show than it was to arouse him.

I lick his abs first, then trace his navel. "Ahh," he moans, hands nearly coming up to cup my head.

"Hands down big guy."

He rubs his face and forces his palms back down. "If you make me come in my pants."

"Oh right, these," I tease him, straddling his hips. It takes all of three seconds for me to whip his belt open, unzip his pants and pull his shaft out of the pocket in his boxers. "Better?"

"Possibly."

"What about now?" I found a notch in his hips the other day where he can feel, just by the groin muscles and ended up having to take a shower after. Finding the same crook now, I flick my tongue against it, tracing the hip bone in circles, lower and lower until his muscles are flexing hard and his hand cover my head. He groans and moans, body shaking. When I bite he lets out a mewl like a cat, flexing muscles that forgot they existed for the last four years. "You moved your hip."

"Involuntary," he gasps. I plant my mouth on him again and add pumping. He's heavy and hard in my hand. "Rin…"

"It's okay, you can come. We have a change of clothes." Another area of improvement. Sometimes he doesn't get there. He can't come no matter how hard I try, but that isn't always the point of these excursions. Sometimes, the fun is just in playing.

The untrained muscles start flexing again. Hip bones shifting ever so slightly. Hot moisture fills my palm, coating it slick. "Oh fuck," he heaves. "That was amazing."

"Mmh, good," I get up and bring over a bowl of water and a wash cloth. He takes care of cleaning himself while I wash my hand off. "Well…maybe we should go take a shower."

"I can't take a shower here. I can barely get the chair in your bathroom."

I can hear the annoyance and unsurety in his voice. How he wants to tell me no. "I don't take no for an answer. I'll show you how to get in."

"And what do I get?"

"A bath with me."

I make a mental note that when our lease runs out, Kohaku and I should find a place with a bigger bathroom. Our year is up in August. He and I have lived in this place together for the past two years. I go in first, running the water and plugging the tub. His eyes are on me as I strip my clothes off. "Come close to the bath, at an angle."

He pushes himself up to the bath and undoes his belt and pants. He never did put his shirt back on after we had our fun in the bedroom. He puts his legs onto the bath and then his feet into the water. "Move your legs to the side so they just slide in."

I tell him, standing in the water. It'll be a tight squeeze, one I'm looking forward to. "Put one hand on the chair and the other onto the tub and slide onto the edge."

"If I fall—"

"I'll catch you. Come on, please? Take a bath with me?"

"This is why we were going to go to my house."

"I'd rather not have sex where your mom can hear. It's weird. And then she giggles about it afterwards."

"Whereas your brother sits down and gives me a talk about respecting his sister and shows me his stash of condoms?"

"Fuck he did that?"

"Yep." He slides his hands along his chair, pushing to the edge of the seat and then grips the bath and the seat at the same time, sliding onto the edge of the bath. I move closer, offering some support to his back, just in case he falls the opposite direction. He repositions his legs again, on either side of me. I take a step back, so he can rest in the water. He leans back in the tub, tying his hair up with a spare hair tie. "You should just move in, Rin. It would make this easier."

"What?" I sit down between his legs, and curl against his chest. "I smell."

"You smell like fourth place." He strokes my shoulders, making me melt into his embrace. "That was an amazing comeback."

"It was, wasn't it?" My stomach dances lightly, hearing what he said. "You want me to move in with you?"

"My house is bigger and suited for my needs. Why not?"

"What about Hak? He can't afford a place on his own. That's why we share."

"I have to come through your brother? I do have a third bedroom in the basement, but it's storage and he'd have to clean it out."

"Stored with what?"

"Old merchandise. Clothing from when I competed. Mom couldn't be bothered to throw it out. Now, with her sober, it's possible we could agree to let it go."

"I don't know…I mean, if I can get on Team USA—" I'm interrupted by his laughter. With my ear against his chest, it tickles my chin.

"I knew it. I knew it…give you a taste of what you can do and you won't stop."

I sit up and kiss his lips, wrapping my arms around his shoulders. "I want it…I have to get my score higher or they won't notice me. Name or no name. Sectionals has to be over 190 if I'm going to get an invitation for the US Championships."

"You need a better coach."

"I need you and maybe a better choreographer and an appointment with a technical specialist. But all I need is you." Getting up I straddle his hips, guiding his hand between my legs.

"Do you want something?" I feel his fingers toy with my curls. His mouth engulfs my left breast.

"Uh-huh."

"Tell me what you want," he speaks huskily in my ear.

"Don't make me beg."

"I'm still learning."

"Don't act innocent." His middle finger caresses my slit, making writhe and heat build.

"Not innocence. I'm still learning your body. What feels good, what doesn't. Where you like to be touched." He presses my bud, making me wheeze out air.

"Definitely there."

"Come closer," he whispers and pulls me into his embrace, making love to me with his hand, taking his time until I see stars and can't breathe.

One week later, we sit around a long table at Sesshomaru's house. Kagome and Inuyasha are moving to Northwestern in Chicago in a week. It has one of the top Neurology residencies in the country. They both smile happily at each other and to their family. Sesshomaru's plants have started budding. He leans over the cucumbers, pulling out weeds as he and Inuyasha walk along the path. I hear snippets of their conversation. Inuyasha is still worried about Sesshomaru being alone. Sesshomaru reminds him that he has me now, which makes me blush. "He really loves you," his mother tells me.

"That's what it feels like."

"He said you want to move in." She raises a glass of sparkling apple cider. My contribution to the goodbye party.

My family is here too. Kagome and Sango hit it off almost instantly before and have promised to stay in touch long distance. "I think saying good-bye is going to be harder for Inuyasha than Sesshomaru," Kagome tells her.

"He wants me to move in. I'm not sure what I'll do, yet…"

"You still have to figure out how you're going to manage skating," Miroku sits down with Kelsey in his arms, bumping her up and down. "You really want to skate down this path again?"

"Tell me how you really feel Mir?" He's never been good at hiding anything from me…then again he and Sango did sacrifice most of their expendable income to pay for my training before.

I didn't find out until after I had fallen that Sango gave up fencing for me. At twelve, just before my mother got really sick, I had a chance to train with the best at a Skate USA at a camp in New York for three weeks. It cost well over three thousand dollars a week. A chance to make the Junior Team USA team. You see, I've been here before, on the cusp of greatness, but I didn't know my wins would be Sango's losses.

Mom couldn't keep up with the bills. We had some sponsors but not enough. She needed an extra couple thousand so she turned to Sango for help. Sango had some money saved up from winning tournaments, but if she dropped out and got a job, then together they could make the money to send me to camp.

The story goes that Sango was up late one night, unable to sleep. After her mom died, she dealt with her own demons and drowned most of them in late night hot chocolate and scary movies. She was seventeen, almost eighteen.

She heard my mom crying in her room. Mom was holding a photobook of all my competitions. Mom was getting chemo at the time. Because of the cancer, she had never managed to be able to find a career. She worked odd jobs, cleaning houses, flipping burgers. Once she even worked at the rink for Kaede. Kaede taught her how to drive the zamboni, up until she was too sick from the cancer to be able to.

Mom had called my dad, asking for money to send me to the camp but he wasn't interested.

That's how Sango found her, sobbing her eyes out because she knew I was good. Kaede had told her on more than one occasion I had the chance to make it to the next Olympics. If I got into this camp and trained and then competed in the US Championships, I could get an offer to join the US Skate team.

Mom was devastated because we couldn't pay for it. Sango was drawn to the room by the sobs. Mom told her that someone had to come first, either me or Sango. Both of us had raw talent, but the pay for fencing, even coaching fencing was abysmal. And the money Sango was bringing in, including with sponsors was just barely covering the expenses to keep her on the playing field.

Sango said mom shivered and shook when she asked if Sango would make a living out of this sport. When Sango thought about it, really thought about it, she decided giving me a chance was worth more than giving herself a shot. And it wasn't just that, that lingering fear of the cancer coming back and stealing my mom from us never left. Sango wanted to be prepared to show Social Services that she was responsible and could hold down a job.

So she gave up fencing. Mom made her promise not to tell me. It wasn't until I broke my knee at fifteen that the truth came out. I was devastated that Sango gave it up. Betrayed that my mom made her choose. The logic was that I would go farther in my sport than she would in hers, and in that moment, mom only had the funds to pay for one of us to succeed and she couldn't decide which one.

In the end, Sango got a job at a local diner and saved all her tips, doubling our income, helping mom support us.

"I'm thinking that unless you are very serious about this that you shouldn't go any further," Miroku says.

"I'm very serious. I just don't know how we'll afford it, again. I can't ask you or Sango for help this time."

"Sponsors?" Miroku asks me.

"Well, Mr. Takahashi has offered to sponsor us, but I don't know what that number means. Band of Seven will too. I spoke to Ban this week and he said they will keep up the $2000 monthly stipend for now, plus send Jak to travel with us and take care of the stretching and massages. That's well worth the cost. Jak would do it for free. That only covers coaching though. I need a technical choreographer and that's going to be around $3,000 for long and another for the short. That already means $6,000 out of pocket. Maybe I should just stick to physical therapy."

"No," Sango takes my hand and rubs my palm, "no we're going to find a way to make this work. If you need more in depth coaching that is exactly what I'm going to get you. Can't we sponsor her too?"

Miroku shakes his head. "No, we're still paying the hospital fees for the twins. After that we could."

"I can help, but not with much," Sesshomaru's mother adds in. "Toga how much are you sponsoring? What's the base number?"

He and Izayoi both turn. "How much do you need now?"

"$10,000," I say, shrinking under the table.

"Break it down?" he prods me.

"$6,000 to pay a technical choreographer. $1,600 to pay your son. Midwestern Sectionals are in California this year. They take place over two days so probably another grand in travel expenses. I guess that's only around $9,000."

"You'll have a check in the morning from my office."

"Really? How much…I mean…"

"Make it past sectionals and we'll speak."

"What about Starbucks?" Kagome pipes up. "Don't they have an athletic program."

"If you work for them," I answer. Once I did look into it. They would have helped me if I had gone this far again.

"It doesn't hurt to ask," Sesshomaru's mom reminds me. "And I'll pay for your travel."

"It's going to get expensive."

"Less expensive than my previous habits. We'll figure it out. You aren't on your own this time Rin," she pats my hand. "We all want to see him stay happy."

"Thank you," I breathe out, surprised by their generosity and slightly relieved. You'd think we're married already the way our families get along.

That night in bed at his house, curled against Sesshomaru's chest I ask him, "Have you thought about how you'll get the help you need? You can feel more now. You have to keep up your physical therapy regimen. How will you do that when we travel? You can't miss."

"I've thought of it."

"And?"

"I spoke to Jakotsu. If he comes to service you, he can service me for the hour too."

"Really?"

"Yes." He kisses the top of my head and turns the TV off and shuts the light out. "Go to sleep, we've an early day in the morning." He presses his lips next to my ear and whispers, "you are so worth this. We'll make it work. I'll find the technical choreographer to start immediately."

And so we hit the ice again, with our hopes and dreams riding on how well I score.


	26. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The time for sectionals has come. How will Rin fair?

**Sesshomaru**

I hate goodbyes. They eat at you, break your heart and remind you that even when your life is finally going the direction you want it to, something can change. I've spent the last two weeks when I wasn't at Band of Seven helping Inuyasha and Kagome pack their house.

By help, I mean that I spent the majority of the time playing with Kieran and taking him to the park to enjoy the warm spring air. Now that I can drive, we often go to the zoo, the children's museum and the parks. Today is our last day together. When I return, I'll hand my only nephew over to his parents and wish them well. Just as I am embarking on a new journey with Rin, they are also leaving for Northwestern for the next six years. By the time Kieran and I live in the same state again he will be nearly nine. Maybe by then, I'll have a cousin for him to play with.

"Again!" he giggles from his spot on the swing, wanting another push. I give his bottom a shove to make him fly. He flays his arms and legs out on the baby swing and laughs hysterically.

"One more time and then we have to get back."

"Okay," he answers. Children, ever peaceful innocent creatures. I would say he doesn't know what's happening but his parents tell me that he hasn't been sleeping well at night. Last night was the first night since March that Rin and I did not sleep in the same bed. While I tossed and turned in the tiny twin bed, Kieran slept peacefully. I think he knows, Uncle Shosho is about to say goodbye.

"That's it," Inuyasha says, shutting his trunk. They're driving to Chicago. The trip will take days as they plan to sightsee on the way there. "You sure you're going to be okay?"

Pulling my brother into a tight hug, I answer, "I'm sure. I have her now."

"Ouch, I've been replaced."

"Never replaced. I thought you wanted me to be more independent?" I ask him, aching deep inside but so happy that he is making this move. I was dead weight, stopping him from chasing his dreams.

"True. You think she's the one?"

"I think so."

"Well then, keep her close and hey, if you need me, you know you can call right? Come visit?"

"Of course."

"I'm going to miss you," he breaks and hugs me tightly. Dulcet tears stream down his cheeks. "Listen…you just…just make sure you take care of yourself."

"I plan to be on my feet when we see each other again." I hold him to me, my anchor, my brother.

"I love you man."

"I love you too. Safe journeys." We part. I watch them until they leave, sitting in my chair. Their home is empty now. No longer waiting for me. I asked him to leave at this time on purpose. Rin has to work and it's nearly 3pm.

"Hold it, hold it," Suikotsu encourages me. I'm on the parallel bars again but this time my legs are down instead of off the floor. The goal is to make my feet feel and hopefully wake up surrounding nerve tissue. It looks like I'm standing, but if I let go, I would topple in seconds.

I focus on the burn in my arms, the cold way my palms begin to ache and small stabs of pain running up my wrists. The ground is cold beneath my feet in the places where I can feel.

Sensation has returned to just below my groin area. I revel in the ability to feel and that the surgery so far seems to be a success. Adjusting my hands, I glance at the ceiling, ignoring the uncomfortable pain in my chest, once again wondering if Rin will be able to anchor me as my brother did. She's offered her apartment when I need to rest, because it's nearby, giving me a home that is near Band of Seven.

"Okay, sit," Suikotsu instructs me.

I lower myself into my chair and catch my breath. "Is there a reason beyond waking my nerves for this?"

"Build more arm strength. Once you can feel more of your legs, we'll work on rebuilding the muscles. During that time as you get stronger, you'll have to wear leg and back braces. This way, your arms will get used to holding your weight on the crutches until the muscle strength comes back."

"I would ask how long that takes, but I already know. Several years."

"Several years," he repeats and motions with one hand over to the floor. Here I must practice rolling from side to side, sitting up and going on all fours. Now that we're done waking up the nerves in my feet, it's time to remind the muscles below my navel that they exist. It's maddening when I can feel but can't flex them on command, or make them engage to help me sit up. Now comes the hard part of rebuilding what's been dormant for four years.

"Looking good Takahashi," Rin says, walking by me and slapping my ass.

"Rin," Suikotsu rebukes her.

"What? It was there," she laughs him off. "Besides no one saw."

"I saw," Danny pipes up. They're removing his back brace today so he can walk with just leg braces.

"Watch me closely honey, I'm not going to show you this more than once," Jakotsu says, showing the boy how to get in and out of the braces.

"I'm watching." Danny clutches the gold medal around his neck. I've been told he hasn't taken it off except to bathe and sleep.

I shift my wait forward as far as I can without falling, backwards, left and right, almost like a toddler who is learning to walk again. This works to strengthen my core and hip muscles, but also again with the hope that my nerves will awaken in my legs. Finally we focus on me being upright, standing on my knees.

The first time Rin made me do this, I was terrified of falling. But like everything, she pulled me in, promised me she wouldn't let me fall and held me in her arms. This time it's Suikotsu who takes me in his arms. I'm forced to hang on as he shifts my hips from side to side. I can feel his hands and a part of me wonders, "stop. Let me try myself."

"Okay." He supports my core while I get my bearings.

Closing my eyes, I focus on the feel of my hips, on trying to push them to one side against his hand. It takes effort, like something is blocking me. "Dammit."

"It's alright, maybe next time."

"I'm tired of next time," I bite out.

"These things take time Sesshomaru," Suikotsu responds. "Just give your body time."

Whether it's from the ache of my brother leaving or frustration that despite being sixteen weeks post-op and still being unable to move anything of my own accord, I push off Suikotsu and catch myself on the ground. "Sesshomaru."

"Just back off." I push myself backwards and pull myself back into my chair, propelling myself out of the office, breathing heavily.

The warm spring sun beats down on my legs and arms. If I focus on the heat, the way it warms my hands and legs, what I'm feeling now won't hurt as badly. The bell to Band of Seven rings, I know before she speaks that Rin is there.

She pulls my head into her stomach, warming my face. "Hey, it's okay."

For reasons beyond me, my eyes become wet. "It's okay, Sesshomaru."

"It's not okay. It will never be okay."

She doesn't speak. Instead she sits with me, until I'm calm, until breathing becomes easier.

I tried support groups after I was first injured. Everyone said connecting to others like me would help me understand that I wasn't alone. But it didn't help. The idiot teenager who jumped from a cliff because his friends dared him, the father of three who was T-boned by a drunk driver and so many others like them. None of them had made it to the heights that I did and passed out in an Olympic Competition. Their failures weren't laid bare for the world to see.

I didn't last longer than a few weeks. I felt unseen, unheard. Like they were so far beneath me. It's what I think about as I drive back to my home after finishing practice with Rin.

We managed to last minute wrangle a technical specialist but it cost more than we were expecting. I picked up the slack without letting her know. She already feels stressed enough, asking her family to support her through this again. "Are you okay?" she asks me when the car stops.

"Fine."

"You're not being honest. You were short in practice. You're upset. Let me in."

I slam the breaks on and pull the car over. "You want in?"

"You know I do," she reaches for me. I pull away. The hurt is clear in her eyes. "What is it? Is it Inuyasha?"

"No," I answer. "What if this is as far as it goes? What if I don't walk again? What then?"

"What then?" she echoes. "You'll still have me."

"Why? When there are so many other men out there. Men that can stand by your side, that can walk down the aisle with you."

"But they can't love me the way you do. Make me laugh? And apparently they can't stay away from my shrine or I would have already landed me a guy. Not to mention the last time I did have a guy that did he gave me a black eye. I like my ex-Olympic Gymnast. Even if he can't stand next to me, he can hold my heart and that's all I care about." She hugs my shoulder, kissing my exposed bicep. "I love you. I'm so lucky to have you."

"I think I'm the lucky one," I say and cup her chin, kissing her lips. "I hate being paralyzed." Burying my eyes in my hands, I let go of my true emotions.

"I know Sesshomaru." I feel her hands tangling in my hair. "Do you need me to drive?"

"No. I just need a minute." I wrap my arms around her waist, leaning on her for support. Inuyasha and I haven't been apart for more than a few days in the last four years. It never occurred to me until now, how much having him near meant to me.

Training for sectionals helps alleviate my mind from thinking of my absent brother and that my surgeons are only seeing me every two months right now to check for improvements. Recovering from paralysis is like wine, they said, it gets better over time. As the weeks pass, more feeling returns to my stomach, to the tops of my feet.

I work closely with the technical choreographer, learning how to calculate points more precisely and how to recover from misses during the program. We were lucky Rin improvised in the last competition but for this one she has to tighten up the performance and close the gap between herself and the other skaters. We shoot for a combined total of 185. 65 in the free skate and 120 in the long program.

Rin trains fiercely, never quitting. She wants this and it shows in how dedicated she is.

On the morning of Sectionals I feel something brush against the top of my toe. "Mmh," I groan in my sleep. We flew in the night before and went to bed early.

"Hey," Rin kisses my lips in greeting. Her hair is mousy, covering her face, obscuring her features. "We gotta wake up. Did you feel that?" She brushes her toes against mine again.

"I feel the top of my foot." My cheeks crease into a smile.

"You were muttering in your sleep. I wanted to test your sensation. If I win, we're going to try to make your hips move."

"And how do you suggest that?"

She raises a sly eyebrow and cups my chin, kissing my lips. "Missionary style, can't do that in PT."

"I like that. No nightmares last night?"

"No. I…I felt safe with you with me. Are you nervous?"

"Relatively, but I'm not the one skating."

"Definitely nervous, but more determined this time. I'm going to blow them out of the water."

"Blow?" I tease, tickling her side. "You won't be blowing anyone that isn't me."

"Hey!" she squirms, trying to get out of my arms. A futile task, because my arms are ten times stronger than hers.

She's on the ice with the second group of ladies this time. They often save the best for last and her scores were mid-road compared to what I'm asking of her now. She can get away with 65 and make it through to the US Championships but if our eyes are on an invitation to team USA, she needs to break 70 in the short program.

Once again, I watch her break into the rumba, shaking and twirling, side stepping and then setting up the first combination of jumps. It starts with a triple toe-loop-triple-loop. She lands them gracefully as if it's nothing, forcing my cheeks to stretch to my ears. She's on fire today.

She leaps into a combinations of spins, sit spin, layback spin and then a giant triple axel. Kaede reminded me that if she can land that now, going back to quads should take another few months of training. Her legs must be stronger.

If she only knew how attractive she was like this. Her face is determined, her hands on fire and more than once I think of the day when I can stand and take her from behind with her leg raised up. Shit…I move my papers over my lap to hide the rising tent.

She wobbles slightly on the final jump and then goes into a forward scratch spin again. The choice for that was the higher points. Forward apparently is more difficult than backwards. She nails the ending with a glorious smile and jumps up and down on the ice a few times before flying off and into my arms.

The technical marks come quickly, 36.66 with a total of 31.98 giving her a 68.64, three points higher than we had hoped. "You were amazing!"

"I can't believe I did that. I knew we had the buffer, but I just felt on!"

We leave the arena, quickly, because I can't keep my hands off her. She was gorgeous on the ice. I feel pride in my skater and if it's the last thing I do, I'll find a room in this damn rink that isn't occupied.

Pulling her into an empty prep room, I push her against the wall and slide my hand underneath the crotch of her dress. "Sesshomaru not here."

"I locked the door." I tear a hole in the seams of her tights and slide my fingers under thong.

"Fuck," she groans, holding my shoulders for support. "Is this thanks?"

"This," I plunge fingers inside her, nearly making her buckle, "this is me feeling alive more than before." I circle her clit, slowly at first and then much more quickly.

"Oh my god," she whispers, rocking her hips against my hand.

We're a frenzy of hands grabbing at each other, of kisses that scrape the lips and until she bites down on my shoulder to stifle her cries. My shirt is unbuttoned and wrinkled, untucked from my trousers. "My god…you made me vibrate. But this," she pats the tip of my shaft. "He's being stubborn this time."

I glance down at my arousal, slightly annoyed that I'm not coming this time, but more overjoyed that I am good at something. "I'm so proud of you and so in love with you."

"Me too," she whispers, sitting on my lap with her head against my shoulders. "I hope no one heard that."

Starting at the age of fifteen, I trained with Kento Narita. He was an ex-pat from Japan that discovered he'd be paid more if he worked in the US. He trained gymnasts from his homeland next to me, often making me wonder where his loyalties were considering Yuru Nakamura was my biggest rival. I may have owned the still rings, but Yuru owned the pommel horse and horizontal bar.

I had to bust my ass every time we were in the same competition to outscore him. Yuru was ecstatic from what I heard after I fell because it permanently removed me from competition. He went on to take the gold medals that would have been mine had I not fallen.

Kento visited in the hospital in Rio when he could. I wasn't his only gymnast in the Olympics. But he tried at first to be there none-the-less. Like all the others, my brother, mother, Kagome, he suggested I coach.

If I had it over to do, I'd tell them that perchance giving job advice while someone is still on a ventilator and has yet to understand the extent of their injuries and limitations is not the best time to make job suggestions. I blew him off, convinced that I couldn't do it. Mostly because coaches are supposed to be there to catch their gymnasts should they fall, lift them up to the bars when they can't jump high enough, all physical things I was and still am incapable of doing.

If I had, I would have had to hire an assistant which would have eaten into my income and then there's discrimination. I would never get paid the same as a non-disabled coach.

But now…I wonder if Jaliel, the boy I met at the sub-shop that one day will see this and the news coverage, that Rin Matthews is making a comeback.

We're ambushed upon leaving the prep room. Cameras, flashing lights and questions coming at us from every angle. How long had we been together? Was Rin concerned that being coached by someone from a different sport would ruin her chances at an invitation from Team USA? That thrust us both into speechlessness. Sure we had talked about it, but neither of us were in the know that a scout from Team USA had seen her short program and they were already thinking of offering her the chance to compete at the Ladies Figure Skating US Championships in another month.

If it wasn't for Sango and Kohaku elbowing their way through the cameras and reporters, I may have had to run them over. A hazard on wheels, but sometimes a painful necessity in situations like this. "A scout?" Rin asks me as we make it to the locker rooms. The hallways is blocked by security, only allowing coaches, skaters and their families to enter.

"What are they talking about?" Kohaku asks me.

"They're talking about Jodi Watkins." Jak comes running up from behind us. "Boy you need to learn who to talk to. Jodi Watkins is watching the skaters at all the sectional events, deciding which ones to bring on board."

"And you know this because?" Sango inquires, incredulously.

"Jodi Watkins was dating this dude named Terry Lawrence, who was dating this dude named Kelly Lincoln, who happens to be my boyfriend's ex," he says.

"What?" Rin asks.

"So if I understand this, you have an in with an ex's ex?" I ask Jakotsu.

"Yep and they want you baby. They're interested in this big come back. Now get in that locker room so I can do my thing and get you limber for the long program tomorrow."

"This is big," I say more to myself as she disappears with Sango and Jak into the ladies locker-room.

"Take a baby," Kohaku tells me and plops Keaton into my lap. "I can't believe she's doing this again."

"She worked hard for it, didn't she?" I say to the baby in my lap, shifting her from side to side.

"You're going to take her all the way? Well. further than you've already taken her."

I hear that jab and smirk, because he has no idea what we just did in an empty prep room. "My goal." He doesn't look happy about it. Which is odd considering his families proclivity towards support. "You don't want her doing this?"

"I want her to be happy and if this what makes my sister happy fine. But you didn't see what happened after she broke her leg. She hasn't glowed since then, not till now and honestly, I was hoping something besides sports would make her glow. If she hurts herself again, she's going to crash. Hard."


	27. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin competes at Sectionals.
> 
> In honor of Esther247's birthday :) Author of A Battle Yet Seen. Here you go :)

**Rin**

Kohaku and I have been close for as long as I remember. I barely have a childhood memory where he's not involved. Mom said on my first birthday he ate my cake right out of my hand. Instead of feeding myself, I packed it into his cheeks. Then there was the time I learned to ride a bike. He stayed behind me, pushing me the entire time and caught me before I could fall.

The first nightmare I can recall, we were at Rina's house watching Jurassic park. I woke up screaming that the T-rex was going to get me, eat me alive. Kohaku was asleep on the pallet next to me. He pulled me next to him and the next thing I know we were both waking up to the light of the sun shining on our faces.

That how I knew he was feeling grim when we ate dinner at Sango's the night before we left for Sectionals. Miroku made sushi for me and Sesshomaru and ordered Pizza for everyone else. Hak pulled me down into the basement and went through my medals. "You already went all the way sis, why again?"

"I didn't last time Hak. I fell before the Olympics."

"But you won Worlds. That's more than the Olympics. That happens every year. You beat out the competition across the globe."

"What's this about?" I took my gold medal out of his hand and put it back in the cabinet.

"I'm worried about you. What if you get hurt again?"

"Injuries happen."

"You were a depressed lump of coal for almost a year Rin and the anxiety got worse after. What if you try and fail?"

"Then I tried."

"You don't think you're going a little fast with Sesshomaru?" Kohaku's face was lined with stress and frustration.

"Hak…is this about him asking me to move in?" He's always been over protective of me. I swear it has to do with how we were raised.

"I'm just worried he's going to let you down—"

"Hak you can't save me from every pain. You may be my big brother, but I think this time you're overreacting. Shippo likes him. Miroku and Sango do and besides, I can't afford rent and skating. If I make it in the top four I need to drop down to part time. Band will go along with it. Come on, you can live with us."

"Third wheel, no. I'll move in with Shippo. He and Kanta are looking for a place together."

"Really? You'll be a third wheel for them too."

"Yet it's easier to hear my brother doing it than my sister being done." He ruffled my hair and walked past me. "Don't worry about me. Where are you sleeping tonight?"

"His house. Why? Should I come home?"

"I think you are going home. With him."

Sesshomaru was in his garden with his plants. He'd finished planting and was tending to the roots and soil as if they were a child. He spent hours outside after dinner, watering, weeding, pruning what had overgrown. He removed the plastic tarp that covered his apple tree.

I watched him with a hot cup of tea, wondering if I could make his room mine. It's large enough another dresser wouldn't be out of sorts. His closet is the size of a small bedroom and not nearly as packed. Inside, I found his shrine. Pictures from when he used to compete. There were three Olympic albums. I took them all out and started flipping through the pictures.

He was so proud and so strong before. His was chiseled and his face, so determined. "Having fun?"

"Shit!" Jumping out of my skin, I dropped the album. "Sorry…I was just looking around to see if I wanted to live here. I hope it's okay."

"In the future you could ask."

"You were so good. How do you come and watch me compete and not feel frustration that you can't?"

"Maybe I'm living vicariously through you." He gave me a hand off the floor. I gather up the photo books and follow him back to his room. "I've thought about coaching gymnastics. I met a boy last fall who needed a better coach but couldn't afford it."

"I bet you would do amazing."

"Actually," he paused and pulled me against his chest. "I was hoping to introduce you to him. I made some phone calls and tracked down his gym while I was outside just now. There's an in-house competition tomorrow. It's before you skate. I'll miss your warm ups. I want to fly back after the short and come back the next day."

"You're ditching me?"

"Only for an evening. I'll be back in time to watch the long program."

"I guess. Do you feel like we're rushing things? If I move in with you?" Turning sideways, I kicked my legs over the side of the wheel chair and relaxed against him.

"Maybe…but if I'm honest, I'm not comfortable at your apartment. You have to move the furniture every time I come over. The bathroom is small and transferring is harder. I like spending the nights with you, but it's easier for me here."

"Fine, I'll move in in August. Not like I'll be home much this year if I make it through Sectionals. Hak doesn't want to move in though. He'd rather live with Shippo."

"Good then I'll feel less guilty banging his sister. It's getting late."

"I know."

The crowd for sectionals is much larger than it was for the Denver Invitational. I've spent the last thirty minutes warming up, doing floor exercises. Jak is with me, helping me to get loose and reminding me that I can do this.

Shippo is with me too. For fun while I warm up, we do lifts from when we used to do pair skating. He holds me high over his head, making me laugh and then drops me head first over his shoulders, catching my waist. "Shippo! If you give me a concussion I can't skate!"

"I'm trying to teach Kanta to skate. Imagine the first ever, gay men's pairs skaters." He twirls across the floor and leaps into a double axel, landing on his right leg and then holding an arm out to me. I follow after him and we jump and twirl around the floor, until the official warm ups are called. "Get your skates on Sis. You can do it."

I give him a quick hug, so he can run back to help Sango with the twins. Miroku and Kohaku are already in the audience.

"You made it, has been." Oh I know that voice. I don't need head games now. "Listen up ladies, this is Rin Matthews, former team member for Team USA and has been extraordinaire. She's going to show us what geriatric figure skating looks like."

"Kick your butt is more like it," I shoot back. Head games are part of competition but I've always hated them.

"Yura, you do know there are rules against bullying?" Thank goodness, I know that voice too. "Now unless you want me to report you to the judges, go find something else to do."

"You're here!" I squeal and hug him from the side.

"Sorry, traffic from the airport."

"There should be rules against sleeping with your coach," Yura mutters as she walks away.

"Only if you're an underage brat," I whisper in Sesshomaru's ear.

"Shh, don't let it get to you. Come on. It's time to get on the ice."

I told myself I would not have a panic attack when I got back on the ice. I wouldn't freak. I would calmy get on the ice, and take my pose, but there are so many people here and I left the short program in fourth place. So much is riding on this. Everything is riding on this.

The last time I had to make it past sectionals was when I was thirteen. It was right after mom died and I went to camp. I trained long and hard, fighting every inch of the way. I face planted on my triple salchow. I knew I had to do something big to make up for it, so I threw in a triple axel. I had been practicing it in my spare time, trying to manage the footing. I spun out on the landing but the added base points bumped me back into the lead.

Sesshomaru and Jinenji, the technical choreographer said, when in doubt, throw in a triple axel. It's worth 10 points. I strike my pose, standing like I'm about to break into a Kata. My feet move backwards, circling the front of the rink, then twirling around to the back. More points are gained for fancy footwork before the jump.

Focusing on the movement, the power of my legs, I leap into a series of three jumps. Triple toe loop, triple loop, double loop. It's met with applause that lights my heart up. We changed the next sequence into circular foot work, to give my legs a chance to recover before we set up the next jump, a double axel. I throw it again, but go all out and leap into a triple. The crowd rises again, making me feel like today is my day to shine.

I just need to score over 120 and I should be in.

From one movement to the next, I'm in the zone. The world makes sense, it spins when I want it to. There are highs and lows but I control their tempo and at the end I break into a series of four spins. Flying sit spin, camel, back down to a regular sit spin and up into an 'I' spin that took Jak stretching my thighs for the last few weeks to do comfortably.

When my foot comes down, I punch the air, knowing that I skated a clean program, on par with little miss shit face Yura who's holding strong in first place. Coming off the ice, I land in Sesshomaru's arms and once again plant a kiss on his lips. Screw no PDA.

My stomach rumbles while we wait for my scores. "Technical marks for Rin Matthews 65.79, presentation 63.23 for a combined score of 129.02, seasons best of 197.66 putting her in second place."

I stand up screaming and waving. "That's fourteen points more than we were hoping!"

"It was that extra axel," Sesshomaru tells me, following me back.

"Still didn't knock Yura out."

"Two points," he reminds me. "You'll take her out at the Championships."

"So confident." Sitting down in the hallway, I slide my boots off and flex my feet. "How was gymnastics?"

"He did well. He's easily the best in his gym. He needs to train with a more serious coach. I spoke with his mother and was roped into telling stories to the children. I think they were more fascinated with my lack of mobility than what I had to say about professional competition. I agreed to mentor him on the side."

"Moving on?"

"Leaving doors open, rather than closing them." I smile, what else can I do. Nearly a year ago all he did was mope.

On time, just as we're about to kiss, a woman approaches us with curly red hair. "Rin Matthews, do you remember me? Jodi Watkins."

"Uh…hi." I get up quickly, wiping my hands and offer her my palm. I try to place her eyes and face but can't.

"It's okay. I was on the Team USA board just after you retired. How is the knee?"

Sesshomaru squeezes my hand, we share a look that warms my heart. "Good," I tell her. "It doesn't hurt much these days and seems to be tolerating the strain well."

"That's great to hear. I wanted to let you know that Team USA will be keeping a close eye on you and we'd like to formally invite you to the Senior Ladies Championships. We'll be passing out invitations then for a chance to join Team USA on the Grand Prix Circuit."

"That's great. I'd love to!" I beam until my cheeks hurt.

"Wonderful. So we'll see you in three weeks." She waves and leaves.

"Oh my god!" I scream and jump on Sesshomaru.

"Rin no!" Sesshomaru yells, but not in time.

His hands fling out behind him, seeking something to grab onto. The chair capsizes and we both land on the floor.

"Oops. Sorry. I'll help you back up."

"You're a menace." He pinches my ass for good measure.

"No fucking you two," Jak comes around the corner. Together we get Sesshomaru back in the chair.

"We weren't."

"Not what it looked like to me. But listen Puddles, if you ever wanna join the all-male team you give me a call alright. Come on Rinny, let's get those joints stretched, so you can stretch him tonight."

"JAK! I have to wait to see if someone knocks me out of second."

They say skating last is the worst because it puts more pressure on you to perform. Skating first means you set the bar for the other competitors. Skating in the middle, you get a fair idea where you're ranking but at any moment, you can go from 2nd to 10th in a heartbeat if enough skaters knock you out of the competition.

I can't sit still. I'm pacing back and forth, sitting and standing, while Sesshomaru rolls off to bring me some cold water to drink. Meanwhile Yura with the dark hair, who's a finicky, pretentious 16 year old, sits happily on the kiss and cry couch, because she's in first place.

She hasn't said anything to me, but those eyes that keep glaring at me say so much more than anything she could possibly spew. 197 is good. It's really good, but in order to compete in Worlds, I have to break 220. That means more triples, more strain on my knee and more practice.

I'm already surviving on part-time income. "Sit," I hear Sesshomaru's voice from behind me. "You skated a clean program. That should be enough for you to relax."

"There's five more skater to go," I remind him.

He yawns, cover his mouth and then pulls me up to his lips, opening his mouth against mine. I melt into his mouth, and then taste something sweet and hard flit from his tongue into my mouth. "Chocolate?"

"I thought you needed a kiss." He holds up a bag of Hershey's Kisses.

"You're the best."

"You're going to get fat eating that," Yura snaps at me.

"Want one?" I take one from the bag and hold it up to her. She looks at her coaches then at the chocolate and then at the coaches again. They nod, giving her permission. She scarfs it down like it's her last morsel of food. "You're welcome."

"Just be patient," Sesshomaru takes my hands in his and we talk quietly about everything and nothing all together. Three of the skaters place behind me. The fourth knocks me out of second into third.

"Dammit," I mope, feeling tears prick into the corner of my eyes.

"Hey, third is still a bronze medal. You skated a clean program, that's all that matters." Sesshomaru kisses my forehead.

By the time the fifth skater finishes, I hold steady in third. "Not bad, for a has been," Yura says, flicking my skates as she walks away.

The tears come quickly, from relief, a stab of sorrow because I didn't make it to the top, well at least not the very top. "Don't you start thinking like that. Gold medals aren't all that matters," Sesshomaru says in my ear. I didn't even realize I'm on his lap, being wheeled to the locker room. This time there's a medal ceremony at night, something we can't get out of, no matter how I beg Sesshomaru.

"You didn't actually think after 10 years not competing that you would come in first?" he asks me.

"I kinda hoped."

"Maybe the US Championships. The competition is only going to get more intense Rin. It always did for me. I wasn't the only gymnast who went back to the Olympics. All our scores got higher and higher. I never had a moment of, wow you can just hand the medal to me."

"I did."

"That was ten years ago when your tricks were unique. Now half the skating world can do them—"

"Is this supposed to make me feel better?"

"No, it's supposed to make you see how far you've come and that it's not about what you do but how you do it. And if you let the head games get to you now and you don't treasure the Bronze you just won, you won't survive the Grand Prix circuit." He stops by the locker room. "Now go clean up."

"I want more chocolate," I pout on his lap, "And sex."

"Sex?" He tickles my sides. "What if we…" he starts whispering in my ears about melting chocolate and spreading it over my stomach and hips and then asks me if I would be willing to get a Brazilian wax, because there are other areas he would eat from. Before I know it, I'm sweating and the only thing I can think of in the shower is him naked and fudge.


	28. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin competes in the US Championships
> 
> So just a note, I made a mistake...They should have been driving to Sectionals, not flying. So we're going to pretend that didn't happen and I'll go back and fix it at some point.

**Sesshomaru**

Life becomes more hectic leading up to Championships. My home phone rings off the hook, news reporters asking for interviews, USAAG asking if I'd considering coaching for them. For a while it was so incessant I asked mother to be our media manager. Now our schedules are organized with military precision.

Rin took a leave of absence to train full time. We attained a new sponsorship from a swanky print shop down town, enough to scrimp by this month, until she returns to work in July.

We're being called the dream team, Fire and Ice, although I'm not sure I agree that I'm ice and she is fire. We spend more time at the rink than at either one of our homes, reminding me of when I used to compete. Six hours a day, five days a week, plus ballet and conditioning exercises, leaving little time for a meaningful relationship.

The first girl I tried to date at 16 was angry with me for not being able to come to her Junior prom. It was the night before I would fly to Tokyo to compete. If I truly cared about her as I claimed, I would come, but in my eyes if she understood me in the least, she would get that nothing can come between the athlete and the sport.

That's most likely why I attained the ice part and Rin the fire.

It's not ice I'm thinking about right now though, it's the fact that twice, my large toe has moved involuntarily in the last four days. I'm at the doctor's office, on their gaudy examination table staring down my left large toe, willing it to move.

It's June, Championships is in two days and I am surrounded by three doctors who are encouraging me three different ways to make my toe move. One suggests breathing in and out while focusing on moving my toe because the nerves they took from my chest were redundant lung nerves. The other says to just focus and pretend like I'm pushing something, until finally Dr. Hazan says, "Try to think of it like a flag, waving one side to the other."

From behind me, Rin's lips press against my ear. "If you move your toe on command, I'll lick your tiger stripes tonight," she whispers it so softly and sensuously the doctor's hardly notice.

Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath and then I feel it, the tickle of muscles moving, one toe against the other. It's almost painful, slowly moving the toe from side to side. "I did it," I whisper in disbelief.

"Excellent Mr. Takahashi," Dr. Okinawa praises me as if I'm a child that earned a chocolate. "This is phenomenal progress. You'll want to practice these motions whenever you can. While watching TV or lounging, if you have time."

"If he has time, he's coaching the comeback skater," Dr. Hazan says with a smile. "Actually, if you two can spare a few minutes, the Director of our publicity department would like to speak to you."

"Sure," I answer, getting up and reaching for my chair. They help me slide off the table and back into my chair. Rin hands me my socks and shoes. I fold my legs over and tie them, feeling an air of excitement. For a moment I stop, set the shoes down and simply touch the soles of my feet. Waves of sensation hit my brain. I can feel the itch of cracked skin, the dry surfaces around the toes and the tender skin of my arch.

"Surreal isn't it?" Rin asks.

"I could have fallen into the forty percent."

"We need to lotion these again. We're going to call Jak to do mani-pedi's."

"No." The last thing I want is that man touching my feet.

"Stop being a spoil sport!"

"I'm not. I simply don't want your friend, touching me…ever."

"He's going to if we make it through the next round. How else are you going to keep up your therapy regimen?"

"I still don't want him touching me more than he has to."

"Well, we both need some fun before the big day. Come on, please?"

"No."

With summer starting and the day before the Championships near, I spend time in my garden. We fly to North Carolina tonight, getting into our hotel late.

Rin went shopping earlier with Jak and Shippo. My garden beds are in full bloom. The zucchini is spouting large leaves that cover the plump vegetation. The melons are just beginning to form and pile together. I have corn stalks growing on one side near the fences and the tomatoes climb their lattices. In a few more weeks, we'll be ready to take the first harvest.

Once again, I roll through the cement walkways, picking out weeds, watering the soil to keep it moist and trimming back overgrowth. Now that we're not at risk for another snow, I remove the tent like tops I added in March. It's hard work that makes my arms burn.

There's only a few more pots to plant. I go to my room, and balance them on my legs, while I wheel myself back outside to start digging holes in the final empty bed. Plucking them out of their pots, careful not to damage the roots, I place them in the ground and tamp the earth down around them.

They'll need the fresh rains to grow. My phone rings, distracting me from my task. It's Kaede, _"Sesshomaru, so glad I caught you. I tried your home number but a woman answered tried to make me get an appointment."_

"My mother is fielding the attention from the media." At times like this I wish I had an electric wheel chair or a third arm. Putting the phone in my lap on speaker, I wheel myself to the apple tree. The apples began blooming weeks ago and in another month they'll be ready to consume. Part of me wonders what I'll do with the extra produce this time. I take my gloves off and set them under the phone.

_"_ _Rin is creating quite a stir. Yura is furious she even made it this far and Jodi Watkins is ready to jump on her if her numbers are high enough."_

All this I know. "How can I help you?" I redirect, not wanting to have this conversation. For the last three weeks all we've heard is our miracle comeback story. The girl who hurt her knee and the coach who broke his back and found meaning in training her again. That is also not quite true, but would they believe that she inspired me to live and not exist and I inspired her to try again?

_"_ _I wanted to let you know after the US Championships, you won't be allowed to continue to train Rin unless you get licensed under US Skating and Professional Skating Association. You'll want to start studying now if you're going to be finished before she hits the Grand Prix circuit."_

"You think she'll place?" I gaze down at my phone.

_"_ _I think she has a shot. She has that fire that she used to. If she can start landing quads, she'll be fine."_

"Thank you Kaede," I say and lift the phone up. The heat of the sun is on my bare back, my shoulders are starting to sting. "I'll look up the requirements and see what I can do."

"You're starting to burn," mother says from the patio doors.

"I thought we talked about not going in my room."

"I knew your girlfriend was out and there was no risk of seeing what you to do in private." She comes out, sipping a cup of sparkling apple cider. Her habits are odd these days. Whatever she drinks looks like beer but isn't. "I made a schedule for July and August in the event that your girlfriend passes. Camp is right after the Championships for a week. It's in North Carolina."

"Shit that's next week." I take the print off from her and begin to study it. "We fly out tonight."

"Shall I tend your garden?" she asks me, sitting on a retaining wall.

"Yes. The timer is on the sprinklers, but if the day is hot make sure the soil stays moist and the weeds get picked."

She touches my bicep and smiles. "You're so different than you were last year Sesshomaru. Before you tended the garden like you were tending a grave, now it's as if you're trying to give it life. Do you think you would have felt the same if the surgery hadn't been a success."

"I don't know." Her hands run along my shoulders. I flinch from her touch, already feeling the effects of being bare skinned in the sun for too long. "Mother, perchance it's best to focus on what is, instead of what could be," I say as I hold a flower in my hand. "That was what got to me before." Flashbacks of flying through the air hit me, of running across the trampoline floor and catapulting myself into an Arabian, a pike, doubles. "Before when I couldn't see past the fall, past losing everything that meant anything to me, it was what if that drove the pain and if I had just seen what is. You by my side, Inuyasha sacrificing everything for me, the people at rehab trying to give me hope."

"It didn't help that Kagura didn't stand by you—"

"Mother—"

"No, Sesshomaru, let me speak. When I found you on the floor in the bathroom, I was heartbroken. You have no idea what it's like as a mother to see her son suffering," her voice breaks, she covers her mouth. "Especially at the hand of someone who loved him so much and at the worst possible time. I felt weak, like I couldn't do anything right. I couldn't fix you. She should have stuck by your side. It was callous and cruel that she didn't."

"Mother," I say in awe of her, of the tears that she had never let me see before. I pull her against my shoulder, another female to comfort. "I would not be here without you."

She has been my swinging anchor, my unknown pillar and finally another I can count on.

A flight to another state presents its own challenges. I've not flown since returning to the states four years before. I was loaded onto my father's private plane with doctors and nurses flanking me, unsure if I would make it. There was still considerable swelling and pain.

Where I had gotten to Rio on my own might, it was the might of others that moved my limbs, shifted my body and strapped me to the bed so that when the turbulent hit, I wasn't thrown from the mattress.

I was so sure that I would be thrown and it was then I experienced my first panic attack. My heart raced, chest ached. I thought I was dying, that my body had been through too much.

The doctors surrounded me, attaching wires, talking about EKG's, lines and spikes. With nothing wrong with my heart, it became quickly apparent that it was anxiety and that I was simply scared, something I had never been before.

Mother was already passed out on the couch, buckled around the waist and dangling precariously from the sofa.

It was Inuyasha who came to my side and held my hand. He reminded me of the days when we were small, before we knew about the issues between our mothers and father. He told me about going to medical school. How excited he was and that he was going to find the cure to my paralysis. He used such flamboyant and precise language to remind me of what it felt like to run through the grass, to fly in the air, to feel below the waist. His words became my strength.

"This is humiliating," I grumble, while transferring out my wheelchair into an aisle chair that leaves little room for me move without falling off.

Rin ties the safety belts, making me feel like a child. "Just think, it's a three hour flight. We'll watch the Hobbit. You said you haven't seen it yet. We'll both take Klonopin cocktails and maybe some booze to go with it and be so shitfaced by the time we get to the hotel we won't know our own names."

"I don't drink," I remind her.

"I think you need to make an exception." She stands up and boards with me, walking in front of me. "You choose the seat."

"We already have seats reserved for you in first class," a flight attendant tells us.

"We didn't pay for first class," Rin balks.

"Oh it's compliments of a Toga Takahashi. Come, we'll get you settled in your seats."

We follow her down the tarmac, with someone else pushing me. I bury my eyes in my hands, feeling more useless the closer we get to the plane. It's one thing to transfer confidently from car to chair, from chair to bed, but this is done with an audience when I haven't done it this way before. Rin stays near me and then slides into the seat first, taking the window. "Come on."

I look at her for direction, sizing up the situation. Lifting the arm rest closest to me, I position my hands on either side of the chair and lift, pushing myself sideways. I nearly slide out of the seat until Rin catches me around the waist and hoists me back up. She waits until I am buckled to sit back down. "Good?"

"Yes, I'm fine."

"Don't be so snippy with me," she bites back and waves the staff off.

"I'm not being snippy."

"That huffing and the face?"

"My arms are constantly sore Rin, what do you want? That I should smile all the time and be glad in my paralysis?"

"No, just that you remember it's okay to ask for help and it's okay to need support."

"I know that," I snap at her. "Just stop talking." My chest is already tightening, my heart beginning to race.

"Hey," I feel her hand slide up my back, first one and then the other. They massage my neck and shoulders. "Did you take the Klonopin yet?"

"Not yet." I take the bag out from between my legs, sift through the disposable catheters and the bag of medicine and find the pills. She hands me a bottle of water and then holds hers up like we're toasting. "Why do you hate flying?"

I close my eyes and rest in the plushy first class chair.

"After I fell in Sochi, I had to be in the plane for twenty hours with a broken leg. It was so painful, maybe more painful than breaking it in the first place because my leg had to be straight. Miroku and Sango had to scrimp money together for a medical transport because I couldn't get in and out of the bathroom. I had to use a portable basin and it was so gross and I my leg kept cramping and I couldn't get up and walk around. They had to sedate me. I couldn't handle it."

I laugh lightly and then tell her about my experience leaving Rio on a private jet, tethered to a bed with only the ceiling. "Movies didn't help did they?"

"Not at all." She takes out an ipad and brings up the Hobbit. We share headphones so that we don't disturb others.

An hour in drowsiness begins to hit both of us. She pushes her seat back and pats her chest. I turn on my side, manipulating my legs and rest my head against her breasts. "I'm exhausted," I whisper.

"I know. I'll massage your legs down when we get there. Pain?"

"Manageable." Nuzzling her chest and kissing her neck, I say, "I love you Rin."

"I know. I love you too."

Championships turns out to be a larger frustration for Rin than Sectionals were. Her jumps are bigger. We added a donut spin into the short program and gliding layback pose that leads into a triple flip, adding extra points for having less time to prepare for the jump. She finishes the short program to her chagrin in fifth place.

That night she barely talks to me but rather watches slow motion capture of her short. Together we conclude that it was nothing that she could have done better. "Doing better isn't the issue Rin. You're out of practice."

"You know I don't really need to hear this from your right now!" she screams at me. "You could at least be supportive instead of sitting there and acting like this is okay. If I don't get into the top four they won't pick me!"

"I'm sitting here because I can't move my legs remember?"

"Oh isn't that convenient! That's not the point!" She slams her hands against the wall.

"Get in bed with me."

"I don't want to."

My stomach flinches at the rejection. If it wouldn't make a scene, I would bounce to the edge of the bed and leave her alone. "You cannot keep expecting yourself to be where you were after only nine months of training. You spent years training before that—"

"I don't need to hear that!" she breaks down, falling onto her knees, making me wish that I could be on the floor with her without it causing pain to my tail bone.

"Then what do you want me to say?"

"Can't you be my boyfriend right now and not my coach?" she sobs out, clutching her knees. "Please…I don't need a lecture."

Breathing deeply, I start making my way across the king sized bed. I throw my legs onto the side and slide into my chair and then move closer to her. "I say this as both your boyfriend and your coach, if you can't make it past wanting to be perfect, needing to be on the top, you're going to fail."

"Sesshomaru—"

"No, take it from someone who has been on the top. You have to beat the mental game. Everything inside of you right now is screaming no because you're afraid, but if you can listen to that smaller voice, telling you that you can, you'll do fine tomorrow on the long program. You have a chance to make fourth or third if you hit all your points and if you don't, can you find value in the last nine months?"

Tired eyes come creeping out from her knees and she nods. "It's been fun. I never realized how much I missed this."

"There's always next year."

"Not really. I'm already old to be doing this."

"Only a year older than I was at my last Olympics. Now come to bed and stop letting the mental game get to you. Perfection isn't what's important, it's doing your best and being satisfied with it."

We move back to the bed. She lets me in first. I slide across until I'm near the other side and then stack pillows against my back. She's one of the first to skate tomorrow, which means she'll set the bar for those that come after her. "You know what we haven't done in a while?" she asks.

"Mmh?"

"Close your eyes and take your shirt off."

And I do, feeling her weight shift the bed around me. My eyes drift shut, knowing what she is going to do. She kisses the crook of my neck, just near my collar, then across the bone, making me shudder in pleasure.

Her lips press against the hollow of my shoulder, sending goosebumps flying down my chest, across my stomach and down my legs. The goal of this game is to see how low she can go before I lose sensation. The last time we played, the dip in my groin is where I lost sensation. The fact that she can now come so close to what used to be my most sensitive area and arouse me shows how far the surgery has brought me.

I can move my large toe on command now and am working at curling my toes. It's odd that the sensation is returning both directions. I wonder at what point the two areas will meet. Will it be at my knees, or maybe my hips. "Oh god," I hiss out as she traces the stripes on my stomach with her tongue. Lacing my fingers through her hair, I encourage her lower and lower, wanting to feel it where the nerves fire more rapidly. Above my navel and just below where a line of silver hair trails down my abdomen and further, where she pulls by boxers down, sliding them down my hips, revealing my growing erection.

She ghosts over my groin with her tongue, making me gasp. Then she grabs my shaft. Heat…pleasure, waves of pleasure and tensity. "I can feel it," I barely manage. "Rin I can feel it."

"You can?" she whispers in disbelief, kissing my mouth enforce. Her mouth digs into mine, increasing the pressure until I fall back against the pillows. I tug on her shirt, yanking it over her head. Palms run up her legs, bringing her backside closer to my shaft. I pull away long enough to ask, "without a condom?"

Her face shifts. Brown eyes peek out from tangled black hair. "Without?"

"I want to feel it. I haven't felt it in four years. This once without," it's as if I'm begging, pleading with her to allow me purchase in her most private places where I've been before, yet haven't felt since my back was broken.

She nods, nervously, rising over me, sliding down my shaft.

"Uh," I moan between clenched teeth. I can feel the moistures, the heat, the way each rock of her hips pushes me in deeper. "Rin," I mutter her name like the wind on my lips, giving me life. "I love you."

"I love you," she answers back, enlivening my soul, breathing fire into my veins.

"Not so fast," I beg, not wanting to let this moment go. To feel it, bathe in it, breathe in the pressure building in my belly.

"Okay." She sits up, rocking harder, making my mouth lag open and get lost in sensation.

I explode sooner than I want, unable to hold back the storm inside of me. "I felt that," I kiss her lips and pull her against my chest. "I can feel you."

"I love you," is the last thing I tell her as she skates out onto the ice to take her pose again. Taking a deep breath, I calm my own nerves. The feeling of needing to protect her from failing and trust that we've done all we could to obtain a high score.

"You look more nervous than a chicken staring at a snake."

"Jakotsu, why the hell are you here? They have PT here."

"I came to watch my baby girl skate." He sits closest to the box waving a big sign that says RIN MATTHEWS IS ONE FINE MOMMA. "She needs to know we're here to love her."

"We?"

"Hey Sesshomaru!" Shippo waves from next to Jakotsu. She did say that no matter where they went, someone from the family always accompanied them.

The music finally starts, she rises powerfully into the kata and then takes off down the rink. We changed the jumps to a triple toe loop, double loop, double flip. She lands them cleaning and immediately moves into the circular foot work, twirling left and then right. A flying splits and then she circles, leaping into a giant triple axel.

A smile taints my lips watching her. She's gorgeous, graceful and so light, like she's flying. It brings back memories from my days. Next to the still rings, I enjoyed the floor exercises.

I would run across the floor, jump as high and as fast as I could and flip in the air. Around the time of the injury, I was working towards being able to do a triple backflip on the floor. It started with a running leap, cartwheel, back hand spring and then a giant flip into the air. The scary part was getting all the rotations in as the ground approached. It was rare, hardly performed. I was going to make a name for myself.

The roar of the audience catches my attention. She's landed another triple axel, banking on the high points of the jump and then flies into a flying camel. She skates with passion and pride. Even if I never walk, this would be enough.

I think of how far we've come. That at first she was the one that brought me out of my depressive stupor and after that, it was I who led her hear. It's as if there's a push and pull in place. There's pride in this. In bringing someone close to their dreams, in watching them fly.

She ends again, with a combination spin of four, giving her added technical marks. All that's left is for the judges to decide what her presentation scores are.

"Third place," she squeals next to me after the awards ceremony. She wears the bronze medal with pride and nerves as the group of skaters is asked to line up in the warm up room. Here her fate will be decided. The judges will let her know if she'll be sent home, or if she'll get to join Team USA and have another chance on glory road.


	29. Rin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin finds out if she gets an invitation to team USA.

**Rin**

I hate nerves, I hate nerves…

I'm in a line of fifteen skaters. The best skaters in the country. Many of us already know that we won't be asked to continue. I'm a wild card. After Ashley Wagner was refused the right to compete in the 2018 Olympics, some said because of her age. I'm not holding out much hope. But I did it. I finished with a 198.45. My seasons best. That alone makes all of this worth it.

Sesshomaru is in the back corner with the other coaches. They're already enjoying the Hors d'oeuvres and toasting the successes of their skaters. He's getting a package of papers to study to become a licensed figure skating coach, which is kind of funny, considering I'm probably the only one he will coach.

The first time I made team USA was just after my mother died. We talked about it, the night before she passed away. She wanted to make sure that I wouldn't give up and that I would keep going. I was so scared of her dying and she knew it.

The first favor she asked Miroku was to take me to the rink every day for practice and pick me up. I never knew it was to create a habit and so that up until the end it would seem normal. Then she told me that the one thing she didn't want was for me to let go of everything. "Death isn't the end Rin, it's only the beginning and I want to watch you from above, knowing you are doing what you love. So you must continue skating."

"What if I don't make it?"

"Then next year you'll try again. You can do anything, Rin. We both know that. And imagine how sad I'd be in heaven if I knew you let everything go for me. One day you're going to understand that life rarely gives us what we want, but what we need. And when it does, I'll always be with you."

Even before they begin choosing names, my eyes glaze over and tears slowly drip down my cheeks. I wipe the first, the second, thinking of my mom up there watching me. Emotions wash through me, bubbling up in my gut, into my throat. I glance over my shoulder at Sesshomaru, who's suddenly not paying attention to the person he's speaking to but me. I hope she doesn't watch what we do in bed at night. I smile at him, knowing that she's happy that I found someone who loves me as much as she did.

"Are you okay Miss Matthews?" Jodi Watkins asks me.

"Yeah…it's just um, I'm fine." I snort back my tears, trying to calm them, but I can't. I'm imagining my mother as an angel on the ice, looping circles around me. I can't stop the tears.

"A moment," I hear Sesshomaru somewhere in the distance. "Come with me. Are you okay?"

"Yeah." I tell him of my vision, of thinking of my mom and how happy she would be to know that we are together. "She always wanted to be at my wedding one day. The first time she told me I thought boys were gross."

He smiles and kisses me gently, wiping the tears off my face. "Shh. It's a beautiful vision. Now breathe, so they can make their choice."

I close my eyes, breathing deeply, with my forehead pressed against his. With each breath, I pay homage to my lost mother, to what I've done to get here and push the emotions back so I can get passed this next chapter in my life.

I squeeze his hand and join the line again, staring down a bunch of teenagers who've busted their asses to get here. They're mostly between the ages of 16-21. I'm by far the oldest and feel like I stand out the most. Yura placed ahead of me in 2nd place. Another girl named Eri Shinzon placed in first. She's nineteen and threw a quad. There's no way I could even get remotely close to her scores without months more of intense training.

Eri is called, Yura, the girl who placed behind me Ayame. Then there's silence that feels like it stretches on for hours, for miles. "Rin Matthews, welcome to the team, again," Jodi says proudly.

I scream and run into her arms, hugging all the judges. "You've got a lot of work to do though," she tells me rather earnestly. "But I think you've got a shot. We'll see you for the camp."

Skate camp is well skating camp. We get up at the crack of dawn for conditioning, weight lifting, stretching and then ballet. After that, we move onto skating and tightening our programs.

Jodi said I really am the wild card. They've been watching me since regionals. Because I've improved in so many leaps and bounds, they're willing to give me another go.

It's an intense week spent on the ice, off the ice and in front of judges who tear your program to pieces and put it back together.

When they're done with me, my 195 score program has a new goal of 220 to compete internationally. I work with acclaimed coaches and relearn some of my old tricks and learn a few new ones. They ask if me if I can try a quad again, but I'm not sure I remember how to get so many rotations in.

"Pole harness or motorized harness?" Jodi asks me on the fourth day.

My stomach cramps. The last time I landed a quad it bent my knee out of shape. I start pacing, unsure I can handle the strain. Yet through all of this, I haven't felt heat or pain in my knee. It's one area Jak has taken special care of while I compete. "I don't know."

"That's not an answer."

"I…I don't think I can land quads yet."

"And I think you're too chicken to try. Rin if you want this, you need to want all this. We can work with the motorized harness to work on the rotations—"

"Harness isn't the issue," I attempt to assert myself.

"Than what is?"

"I'm not sure my legs are ready for it. I just got back into shape and—"

"Rin?" she deadpans me, making me shrinking in my shoes. "If this is what you want, then you need to fight for it. You can't just expect everyone else to do the work for you. Not even your hot boyfriend. You might want to get a coach that can walk too—"

"Excuse me!" I shout, with hands on my hip. "We both know any one of these coaches cannot perform the jumps or the routines they ask their skaters to and the ability to stand has nothing to do with it!" I'm already storming off the ice and kicking my boots off before she can stop me.

I break into a run, exiting the arena, fleeing down the street as fast as I can. I run until my lungs are on fire and I feel like I'm going to pass out. I throw myself into the street and leap over the Jersey barrier, landing on the other side. I scamper across the street into the hotel, running up the stairs until I get to the gym that's been turned into a physical therapy center.

Sesshomaru is on his knees, holding Jakotsu uncomfortably by the shoulders to stay upright. Another exercise to rebuild strength in the legs. Sesshomaru's gotten more stable now that he can feel the muscles in his stomach. I land on my knees behind him and throw my arms around his stomach, burying my eyes into his back.

The force of my weight sends him forward, making him hug Jakotsu instead of just use him for support. "Rin…"

"This is comfortable," Jak chuckles. "Get off your boyfriend, we're both going to go down."

I let Sesshomaru go. Once he's sitting, I throw my arms around his neck and whisper, "I can't do this."

"Jak a minute," he asks.

"Nuh-uh, something wrong with my girl. I need to know. What happened baby?" Jakotsu sits down with us. "I promised your family I'd keep an eye on you after Shippo left. Now spill it. You can't what?"

"I can't do a quad. They want me to try."

"You knew this would happen," Sesshomaru says, pulling me back. His thumbs run over the curves of my cheeks, drying my tears.

"But I'm not ready."

"Ready doesn't matter. If you want to make it on the Grand Prix circuit, you have to want it—"

"I want it, that's not that point!"

"Then what is the point of all of this Rin? You knew going into this that you needed to train harder. The Russians teach their girls to land quads and triple passes. You aren't going to last one competition if you can't get over this fear you have of getting hurt."

"Why are you being so hard on me?"

"Because you need to hear it. You have a rare chance here, right now Rin. You aren't doing yourself any favors by getting into a tizzy any time you're faced with a challenge. If this is going to happen any time anyone pushes you, you will fail."

"I can't believe I'm hearing this from you. I asked you to help me. To build me up, not tear me down." I back away from him, hurt and frustrated.

He rubs his eyes and says quietly, "If you can't get out of your own head and understand that you have a real shot right now, maybe it is time to quit."

"You…I…" I can't finish. I stumble backwards, wounded and bolt from the gym, leaving him and Jak behind.

"Rin!" I hear Jak calling after me. "Rinny! Slow your ass down bitch!" He grabs my arm, yanking me to a stop. "Now you listen to me right now—"

"I don't need to hear it from you."

"The fuck if you do, listen to me…what he said, all of what he said is true. You are so stuck in your own head. So worried that you're going to hurt yourself. You're not seeing the bigger picture." He falls between his knees gasping for air. "When did you get faster than me?"

"It's all those hours on the ice. Why does he have to be such an ass about it though?"

"Honey, he's your coach during the hours of 8am-6pm here and whatever hours you two make after that. That knee is strong and healthy. We both know we've put the hours in to keep it that way."

I want to scream, to cry, to throw my hands up in the air. I knew competition was tough. It just seemed so much easier when I was a bright eyed fifteen year old who thought she couldn't be felled. I didn't know better than to believe the world was fair and all my dreams would come true with hard work.

"Are you really going to throw all this away? Months of work for fear?"

I pause, thinking about it. I drift back to the first time I threw a quad. Kaede told me not to. She said it was a bad idea, I wasn't ready. But the Russians were doing it and so would I. When she wasn't looking I set it up. She caught it just as I flung myself up into the air and got all the rotations in and then landed on my ass. She was madder than hell at me for trying but then surprised I could nail the rotations.

After that, we worked on the harnesses until I was ready to work on my landings. The next time I threw it, I double footed the landing. After that I fell. On the last try I landed it. Kaede was so happy.

"I'm going to try." I hug Jak and sigh looking into the gym. "He looks mad at me."

"You were being a sorry bitch. That boy has worked his ass off for you to get this far. Next to him walking again, this means everything to him."

"Now you're a psychologist?"

"Honey I know patients. Especially that boy. Remember he was mine before he was yours."

"Jak!"

"And stop being so damn emotional on the poor son of bitch. Gonna give him a heart attack. He loves you and if he's going to coach you, you need to take it like a woman."

"Okay…"

"And apologize."

"I know that."

"Then what are you doing over here?"

"I should get back to the rink."

"Leave him in a lurch why don't you."

"AHH!" I turn in a circle and walk back to the physical therapy center. All eyes are on me, making me churn awkwardly. I get on my knees in front of Sesshomaru and sit on my heels. "I'm sorry."

He raises an eyebrow and shakes his head. "I don't understand you, this is what you wanted. Do you really think you're so unworthy?"

"Maybe not unworthy, but just scared I'm going to make an ass of myself and in the process hurt myself."

"We both know injuries are inevitable. What did you do when you were a child and fell?"

"Cried and then got over it and tried again."

"Exactly. Now enough with the emotions."

I smile at him, nodding. "I'll see you later."

When I get back to the rink, I force my stomach to calm itself. This is my time. "I'm sorry. I…I was nervous and maybe a little scared," I tell Jodi and the other coaches. "I'm ready now. Can we start on the harness first and do floor jumps and then work on the ice?"

Jodi smiles broadly and pats my shoulder. "I knew you weren't going to quit."

Twirling in the harness feels like spinning in a hurricane. The newer ones are motorized so someone else doesn't have to spin you. I count the rotations over and over in my head to know my start and stop points and when to land. We practice spinning first and when I feel like I have the hang of it, I dance myself into the right position to do quad toe loop and land on my ass.

Any sport teaches you to keep moving, to keep trying. To not let the pain get to you. I go up again, and this time fumble and land on my face. Whining, I peel myself off the ground and do a single and then a double, feeling the trajectory of the ground and then run and throw myself into the quad. I land with a hop in a way that would have me on my ass on the ice, but manage to stay upright. "Yes!" I grin like a school girl who's won her first spelling bee.

"Tomorrow's the last day. Time to land that on the ice."

The skaters eat dinner together and the coaches with the coaches. Let me tell you, it's a bit more than awkward when the girls around you giggle because they know you're dating your coach and probably sleeping with him. Because hey, I'm twenty five. Why wouldn't I be sleeping with him.

We talk about our jumps, our landings and then the topics turns to the Olympics. Some of the younger ones have never been. I tell them what it was like in Sochi and how excited I was.

I expect Yura to have something to say about it, but instead she listens with just as much rapt attention. "Really you should ask my coach. You know he went three times for Gymnastics."

"Why's he in the wheel chair?" a younger girl named Shasta asks.

"He broke his back in Rio," Yura snipes. "What? You think I didn't know that? Gotta know the competition."

"Wow…I don't know if I'd be able to live after that," a girl named Serena says. "I think I'd rather be dead."

"Sometimes, you find other things to believe in. It can be just as meaningful to help someone else achieve their dreams," I say, picking up my soy milk and drinking it. "That's what I did. I fell in practice in Sochi and broke my knee very badly. It was a hit to team USA. I made the most of it. I went to college, got a PhD in Rehab Sciences and even if this doesn't work long term for me, my job will still be waiting."

My mom said, when life throws lemon, make lemonade. I asked her what it meant when she was terminal. How could we make lemonade out of her death. She said to live, laugh and enjoy our lives. Sometimes a challenge seems insurmountable but there's always a road to healing. Which made no sense to me, because after all, how could she find peace with not seeing me grow up, with leaving me behind. Then she said something I have never been able to forget, "It hurts to leave you behind, more than you can imagine. Yet, I know that you'll be loved and that whatever happens in this world, you'll remember to look for the good, to help others, to have compassion. Through that, I will live on in you."

We fly home on a Sunday, surprised by a joint party thrown by both of our families. There's pizza, beer and talking until we're both completely worn out.

Somehow Sango had called Sesshomaru's mother to talk about the party and then Sesshomaru's mother called his father. It went from there to Kagome and Inuyasha, who flew in for the weekend from Chicago.

I'm not sure I've ever seen Sesshomaru happier. He keeps Kieran on his lap. The big boy who is three now and potty trained and very excited to tell Uncle Shosho all about how he sits on the toilet and flushes.

Kagome tells us about finishing Nursing school at a new college and then surprises us with even more exciting news. "I'm pregnant," she beams.

"Really?" Toga smiles.

"Really. We're due in December. We find out the sex in another month," Inuyasha says, broadly grinning from ear to ear.

"That's wonderful!" Sango toasts them. "Don't get any ideas Miroku."

"We already have five children, what would another one be?"

"At least, please, let's make it to the twins second birthday," Sango begs him.

"Five children?" Toga asks curiously.

"Well," Miroku starts and then launches into the story of our very unconventional family in the making. Well…maybe dreams can come true.

During the summer, we do nothing but train. I'm forced to go on a sabbatical from Band of Seven. Bankotsu was more than happy to give me extended time off to work practice and live the dream, with the promise that the job would be waiting for me.

Sesshomaru and I spend hours at the rink and then nights at his house. By August, I move into Sesshomaru's house. At first it's odd, because it was his home and doesn't quite feel like mine.

That is until his mother takes me shopping at Bed Bath and Beyond and tells me to pick new decorations and Lowes after that. We spend a weekend painting the walls in the small living room and arranging the new furniture.

We repaint his room with light blue walls, add another chest of drawers for me and clear some of his clothes out of the closet.

Then we start making the basement more accessible. He already has a stair lift so he can get in and out of the basement. We clear out his old clothing and start selling his outfits from when he competed. "Don't sell that," he says, pointing to a trampoline, parallel bars, horizontal bar and a pommel horse.

"How did you have these here?"

"I had to practice."

"You had full access to a gym."

"Yes, however," he says proudly, "if I was home with a sprained ankle or couldn't make it to the gym. Mother scrimped to buy these for me. I think I know someone to give them to."

"Jaliel," I laugh. Taking a rag, I wipe the dust off them.

"Exactly. Don't you have a doctor's appointment today?"

"Ugh, I don't want to go. I hate having to go so often."

"It is for your benefit."

"I know. But it makes me nervous every time."

Mom shielded us from the hospital. She didn't want us to go in and see her get sick. Or when they couldn't find a vein and had to put in the porta-cath. She wanted us to keep living and laughing, to be kids and not have the cares of an adult.

It was easier said than done. Each time she went in for testing, we waited with baited breath for the results. Would the cancer come back, was it in remission, would she back on chemo, leaving Sango to help us with our homework, tuck us in at night and read us stories.

Up until the end, when we hired the home-health aid and were forced to say goodbye, she tried to shield us from it.

It's why I'm shaking in my shoes in October when I go into the phlebotomist. I have to get my blood tested bi-annually now. Check for lumps at least once a week and early mammograms. That's also why I asked Shippo to come with me. I can't put my family through this, or Sesshomaru. Even though I know they worry, even though they'll be waiting for me to tell them what the results are. Mom was in her thirties when she got sick. With any luck, if I get it, they'll catch it early.

That's what I tell myself as the tech ties the bright orange rubber band around my upper arm. I close my eyes, trying to distract myself from the poke. From the discomfort. "Just breathe," Shippo says, holding my hand.

"Like you're a professional at this."

"I've had my blood drawn a few times," he reminds me. "When you guys had my tonsil removed."

"That was awful."

"And when I first came to live with you."

"Yeah…that was so scary." We had to test him for STD's because of what he had been through.

"I give blood sometimes now. It's not so bad once you get used to it."

"And we're done," the tech says.

I breathe a sigh of relief, letting go of the tension while we walk out of the office. "Thanks Shippo."

"Any time Sis. When's Skate America again?

"Two weeks. It's in Vegas at the Orleans Arena. You coming?"

"Of course. Kohaku and I are going to drive out with Sango and Miroku. They're renting a mini-van but freaking out about it. They're afraid of being on the road with the girls. Get this, Toga offered to fly them in his private jet. He's going too."

"Since when did you guys get so close?"

"When you were at camp. He thought he should get to know our family a bit and since then, he likes to check in and say hi. Sango says it's his way of trying to support Sesshomaru and you. Honestly Miroku is over the moon about it. You know how they are with connecting to other people."

"So true." Of course my family would welcome his like family. That's just how we are. "I guess we're setting a precedent for how in-lawed family will be. Did they talk to Kanta's family?"

"Miroku took them out to lunch, had a heart to heart." We get into Shippo's car. "They talked about how challenging it can be to accept him being gay. Then how happy they were we were together."

"Family fun."

A week later I get a call from my doctor while we're packing our clothing up. I kiss Sesshomaru on the cheek and walk into what is now our garden. We christened it ours with a pear sapling on the opposite end of the apple tree. The little thing is held up by a rod and looks rather pathetic, but is growing as expected. We can't ask for more from a sapling.

"You're sure?" I ask the doctor as she explains my results to me. My stomach tightens.

"Very sure. There's no mistaking those levels."

"Thanks," I mutter, hiding under the boughs of the Apple tree so Sesshomaru can't see my tears…how am I going to tell him?


	30. Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin competes in her first Grand Prix tournament. But things don't always go the way they should. 
> 
> ONE MORE CHAPTER AND THIS STORY IS DONE!! WE CAN ALL THANK VILBERN ON FFN FOR THIS.

**Sesshomaru**

"Are you sure you're alright?" I ask Rin once we're settled into our room at the hotel. It's more spacious this time with a separate kitchen and sitting area.

Thanks to the media surrounding her come back we've garnered more sponsors giving us both a little more financial freedom. More her than me. Before she moved in she insisted on paying rent, to which I reminded her on her salary was not a good idea. Without a mortgage and with my trust fund intact again, utilities aren't large expenses.

"I'm fine," she answers, but there's something off in her voice.

"Nerves?"

"I think so. I can't believe it. It's my first Grand Prix event. I haven't done the Grand Prix circuit in eleven years. I feel like it's the comeback of the century."

"You're ready?"

"As I'll ever be. You said the last practice was solid and I have two quads in the long program, one in the short. Who knows, maybe I'll be golden."

"One can hope." I rest my lips against her neck. "You're sure it's nothing else?"

"Nothing else," she says quietly, covering her mouth. "I'm so tired."

"You say that often lately. Are you sure you're okay? Maybe we should take a few days off after this."

"If you keep asking me that I'm going to think you're a mother hen. I'm fine. I promise." She turns and kisses me. "Just really, really tired."

A part of me worries. She's been exhausted the last few weeks, more than usual. She falls asleep earlier in the evening and is harder to wake for practices.

When asked what the results from the blood test were, she said everything was normal and then we didn't speak of it again.

During practice for a time it was like her body was more lethargic for a few days but then snapped back.

I exhale against her neck, smelling the hints of soap and fresh leaves. Rin helped me harvest the fruits and vegetables this year. We gave the abundance to father and then took the rest to Jaliel's gym. He's a rare talent.

I've watched him more closely over the last few months. Quietly I've paid for his added training with Selene Ballard. He can now do a layout and half twist. He shines on the pommel and after speaking to his mother, I've decided to coach him once this season ends. If Rin makes it through the Grand Prix season, she'll need a stronger coach than I. And if I'm honest, I'm exhausted with the fighting being her coach causes.

She falls asleep quickly, drooling on her pillow, leaving me to watch as her breaths rise slowly yet steadily. Her lips pucker slightly as she sleeps and her hair splays around her face in a mess. She's beautiful asleep. I smooth the hair out of her face and kiss her cheek. She's competing the middle mid-afternoon with skaters from around the world.

The grand prix circuit works much the same way that it does in gymnastics. She competes in two or three events. The scores are averaged and the top three skaters are chosen to compete at World's at the end of the Figure Skating season in March. It's still a long shot for Rin, not only because of her age but because although she's made it into the local competition, the Russians have owned the ice for years. If she makes even the slightest mistake tomorrow, she'll be out.

We wake with the sun shining down on us. She takes a shower first and gathers her gear while I go over our agenda for the day. We have a small press meeting before we get on the ice.

Our day starts with smoothies and muffins. Again she's quiet and chews slowly. "Ready?"

"As I'll ever be. Think they'll ask about our sex life again?" she jokes between sips of coffee.

"No comment," I reply. The summer was not calmer at all in terms of press. Everyone wants a piece of the girl that broke her leg and the gymnast that lost his career at twenty four and is now finding meaning in something else. I've been asked once again to write a memoir of how I recovered to inspire other paraplegics.

I'm not sure how I would start it. There once was a boy that drove his mother insane cartwheeling around the house. When she couldn't get him to sit still and his antics drove his father mad, she took him to the magical land of Gymkhana where he learned to flip and somersault with the best of them.

I could write about my climb to the top, but that all comes down to dedication. Dedication and shutting out everyone and everything that stands in your way. But then whenever I think of the fall, the years of wallowing, I wonder what kind of example am I. It took falling in love to find the strength to pick myself back up.

The press event is for skaters only, giving me some much needed time to myself. I kiss Rin goodbye before she goes back to the hotel to meet with them in the lobby. I on the other hand run a secret mission to meet Kohaku and Shippo at their hotel room.

The whole family has turned out to watch Rin skate. My father, who never could be bothered to come to my events believes showing up and watching me coach will make up for the missed meets before. I'm not sure I agree with him, but the effort is appreciated.

Mother came to continue managing our schedule and run interference with the reporters wanting to know more about our relationship than I feel privy to share. I learned quickly in my life before that less is more, if you want the people around you to have as much privacy as anyone else.

Shippo waits for me in his room, beaming madly. "Did you get it?" I ask him once I'm inside.

"Yes. Are you sure you two aren't rushing things?" he replies, making me wonder if perhaps I am rushing things. The last time I was this sure, I waited and waited and then broke my back and lost the woman I loved. This time, I know what I want.

He hands me a small black box.

It took me some subterfuge and espionage to this pull off. With Kagura I had her father take her ring shopping, claiming that a family member had passed away and they were resizing a precious family keepsake.

This time I asked her brothers to find the right size. They after all are a close knit family. Why wouldn't her brothers know what to buy her. They dug around in her jewelry while we moved her in and lifted one of her rings, pulling the size from that and replacing it before she had a chance to notice it was missing.

Then I spirited myself off under the guise of added physical therapy with the devil himself to find something she would like. "Your girl isn't ostentatious. She likes simple things. Something in a sapphire or another colored gem. She doesn't like diamonds."

We hunted through Blue Nile again, like I had last time and found the perfect setting, white gold, diamonds along the sides and a gorgeous sapphire to crown the ring. I have yet to decide when to give it to her, during the awards ceremony, or maybe in the kiss and cry box after she receives her scores.

"It's perfect. Thank you."

"Take good care of my sister," Kohaku warns me. He is ever the skeptical one. Why would he be anything but that? I know that feeling, to not believe that love is real and that if you give into it, you risk losing yourself.

I roll into the Orleans Arena in time to find Rin warming up off ice. She's with the other skaters on the floor, dancing in circles like ballerinas and throwing themselves into large jumps to warm their legs up. Others are off in the corners doing box jumps and a cluster from Japan in a corner stretching.

Rin waves at me when I enter but then goes back to her warm ups. She holds her arms elegantly like a circle, spinning around and then leaping, tucking her arms into her waist and landing on her right leg. She beams, for once full of hope instead of fear. I roll up to her, dodging the flying females around me. "Are you ready?"

"As I'll ever be." She stretches her ankles up behind her back. "My leg's a bit stiff this morning."

"Did you have Jak massage it?"

"Yeah, but it still feels stiff."

"Let me see it." I pull her leg onto my chair and massage her calf, feeling for deformities, signs of pulled muscled and injury that we may have not noticed before. Most figure skaters are injured from the stress it puts on their bones to jump and land. "Better?"

"Yeah."

"Nerves?"

"Manageable today."

"Good."

She suddenly pales and holds her stomach. "Except I need to throw up. I'll be back."

I watch her fondly as she runs away and blanches in a trash can. I used to throw up before big competitions. Not that I wanted to, but often the stress of and pressure was so intense it had to manifest itself somewhere.

She comes back, wiping her mouth and exhales. "Well…that's better. Okay, it's time for warm ups. There are so many amazing skaters here. Alina has won World's the last three years from Russia. And the Japanese are amazing this year. Yukino has won every competition she's entered."

"It's intimidating isn't it?"

"A little. Especially because they're younger than me and I'm the wild card remember?"

"Yes but you did nail all the practice performances. If you can just keep your head in the clear you'll be just fine. Skate and enjoy it. Don't let the pressure get to you. You earned your place here."

"How did you all of a sudden become the positive thinker? I remember a man only a year ago that would barely get out of his wheelchair to exercise and had to be enticed with a beautiful woman."

He shrugs. "Maybe he fell in love and sees the color in the world again."

"Maybe." She winks as she starts tying pulling her boots on. "What if we hadn't met? Think we would still be on this track?"

"I don't know. I try not to think about what if, rather than what is these days. What is, is that we are here at your first Grand Prix event and that you are going to show the world what you are made of."

She kisses my lips and together we work our way to the ice. She glides onto the ice with the other skaters, waving to me. She has fifteen minutes to warm up before they get off the ice and the next round of programs begins. The current lead has 198 points. She'll easily dethrone Greta Eichler from Germany, but it's the Russians and the Japanese that will give Rin a run for her money.

I watch her with rapt attention. We changed the music of her short to something with a more gradual pace yet still dynamic and highlights her strength. She circles into her first set of jumps, dancing on her way in and throws herself into the air. Triple flip, triple loop.

I've had to learn to school my responses, knowing that she watches me as she skates. I grip my knees each time she enters the next sequence, feeling the air tighten in my chest with anticipation, waiting for her to hit the marks.

She leans back into a layback spin and comes out with a smile, captivating the audience. Her next jump is a mammoth of a triple axel which she lands wobbly and with clenched teeth, causing me concern.

I bite my lip waiting for the quad that will push her points to the next level. There's an interplay of straight line and circular footwork leading up to the jump and then a circle to gain the speed needed. She bounds into the air and then spins on the landing, catching herself from falling completely and skates the last forty seconds of the program. "Somethings wrong," I mutter more to myself moving closer to the lip of the rink. I can see it in her eyes.

She finishes with a standing ovation, flowers and stuffed animals thrown onto the ice. She slides onto her knees holding her ankle, sobbing. If it wasn't for the fact that I know when she is happy, when she is sad and how her face contorts in pain, one might say she's crying because of the slips, or because even with them her technical points dethroned the leader.

I know better.

I push myself onto the ice, calling for a medic on my way out, heart racing and chest palpating. I pull the breaks close to Rin, sliding to a halt next to her. "What is it?"

"My ankle. It cracked on the triple. I can't get up…Sesshomaru." She reaches up to me, with arms outstretched. I lean over my knees and support her weight, pulling her onto my lap. Not that I should, this could cause bedsores, but she can't stand.

By now we're surrounded by the medical team who follow us off the ice and to the doctor's room. The entire time Rin sobs in my ear. "It hurts so much."

"She's bleeding," another says, pointing to her ankle.

"She must have nicked her leg on one of those jumps."

We don't have time to celebrate that she placed first for shorts, or that she is now at the top with a seven point lead. Her leg is soaked in blood and so are my pants. "I have you," I tell her, letting someone else push my chair so I can hold her securely to me.

She doesn't calm until they numb her ankle and stitch the broken skin close. "It looks like a sprain. You'll want to take her to get an X-ray."

She stares at the ceiling with tears streaming silently down her cheeks. Each time I try to wipe them, more come. I know this feeling too. I once had to pull out of a competition when I fell and jarred my shoulder on the horizontal bar. I felt hopeless, like all my efforts had been for nothing.

My chair makes it so that I can only hold her face in my hands. "Thank you," I say to the doctors. When they've finished wrapping her ankle, I ask for a few waterproof bandages so she can shower tonight.

She still can't walk on her ankle without limping. "It's going to be alright."

"No it's not. It hurts so much."

"Hospital first to check for a break. You're sure you heard a crack?"

"I'm sure."

"Okay. Come on."

"You know I shouldn't sit on your lap so much."

"And you shouldn't put weight on that. Let's go."

"I'll carry her," I hear a voice over my shoulder. It's Jakotsu. He doesn't give her a chance to argue and pulls her into his arms

I would be lying if I didn't admit that I feel a pang of jealousy. If I could stand and walk, I would be the one carrying her. He takes her to my car, in time for us to get flanked by worried family members.

"Rin!" Kohaku calls, running for her.

"What happened?" Miroku asks.

"She felt her ankle pop on the triple…" my mind reels, "you kept skating after it? Why didn't you stop?"

"I didn't want to give up. Not like last time." She sniffles wiping her nose, while Jak loads her into the passenger side.

"You are crazy," Sango says gently. "You should have stopped."

"No," Rin shakes her head. "I want this."

Because I am not family, I'm asked to wait outside in chairs. I watch Miroku and Sango roll my heart away behind doors I'm not allowed to enter. No sooner do I sit than my phone rings and my father inquires what happened. Once again I explain that she heard her ankle pop and we're waiting for X-rays.

Next comes a call from mom and then my phone begins ringing off the hook again. I could say no comment over and over. I ignore and silence my phone rubbing my temples. "She's going to be okay," Shippo says.

"She's going to be so upset with herself," Kohaku says. "She used to take injuries very personally."

I can't respond. I'm more concerned about what's going on behind those doors. I text her to keep me updated. She sends back a smiley face emoji and then admits that she's scared she's going to have to pull out of the long program.

It's not safe to skate on a bum ankle. She'll do herself more harm than good if she tries. So we wait and wait.

Hours later, I'm told that her ankle is not broken, only sprained and combine that with the laceration on the quad, they feel it's best if she withdraws.

She's quiet on the way back to the hotel.

I encourage her to take a bath and try to relax.

At our room, she strips down in front of me, in all her glory. I wrap her ankle up and help her into the bathroom.

As the water runs, I take out the ring that I had planned on giving her at the podium, or the after party. Maybe now is the best time. My stomach clinches in nerves that I push off. I'm sure she won't say no. Our relationship has never been about being something we aren't. It's always been based on the simple delights of being with someone who understands you.

I strip my clothes off and grab two towels. Knocking on the door, I turn the knob, relieved to find she didn't lock it. I stash the ring in the basket below my chair and roll to the edge of the tub.

She looks dejected in the water, like she hasn't stopped crying. "Can I join you?"

"Sure," she answers, scooting forward in the tub and tucking her knees up to her chin so I can slide in. I land in the water with legs spread so she can find solace against my chest.

She curls against me, holding my shoulders. "They said it was from stress. I said my ankles weren't strong enough for quads."

"I'm sorry." I stroke her dampened hair, and cup water to pour on her shoulders.

"It'll be okay," she mutters. "Maybe it was for the best."

"You know I hate when people say that. They said it when I broke my back and I'm not sure _find the good_ was the right thing to say when I was freshly injured."

"Definitely not the right thing to say."

"Then why did you say it for yourself?"

"Because I'm s-s-s-so disappointed," she breaks again, crying weakly. "I wanted this Sesshomaru, more than anything and with a bum leg, I can't."

"We can wait and see how it feels in the morning."

"No…I really can't—"

"Rin—"

"No." She sits up abruptly and covers my mouth. "I'm pregnant."

"What?" I balk, not sure I'm hearing her right. "But you're on birth control and we use condoms. How?"

"Remember when you first felt it? And we didn't?" She wipes her eyes again, shifting below me. I can feel her brushing the skin between my legs, making me hard with desire.

Shaking my head, I close my eyes in disbelief. I assumed I was sterile or that my disability would prevent me from being able to reproduce. "You're sure?"

"It showed up in the blood tests. There were elevated hormone levels so they ran a pregnancy test just in case."

"So then how far along you?"

"Thirteen weeks. That's why I was so tired. I thought it was all the training and I wasn't having periods from the diet and the rigor of the training schedule. I didn't even think of pregnancy."

"Why didn't you say something sooner?" The tests came back before we left.

"I wanted this and if I told you, I thought you might talk me out of competing. The doctors did, but I wanted this one competition, just this one to try again. Does that make any sense?"

"All the sense in the world." I stroke her hair from her face. My gaze is drawn to her belly. I never notice before how it was rounding slightly, or maybe it's just my imagination knowing that we created a life together. "Maybe I should tell you then that I planned to propose to you tomorrow."

Her face brightens in shock, eyes widening and new tears springing into her cheeks. "Really?"

I reach into the basket of my chair, removing the velvet box. I open it and hand it to her. "Probably not the best to propose like this and since I can't get down on one—" she cuts me off, kissing my lips, tangling her tongue with mine. "Yes," she mutters, "it was always going to be yes."


	31. Epilogue: Sesshomaru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens in their future. Find out.

**Epilogue: Sesshomaru**

In the end, she was forced to withdraw. It would have been foolhardy to skate on an injured ankle.

We flew back home to Denver two days later. She went back to work at Band of Seven, careful of the ankle and I found myself in the gym with Jaliel, relearning skills I had all but forgotten. When I wasn't there, I was in physical therapy, gaining strength in limbs that had long forgotten they existed, learning to move all my toes and preparing for the day that I would regain the ability to support myself.

Rin's pregnancy progressed and with it the cancer that we both feared. The combination of hormones activated the breast cancer gene just as it had in her Aunt Rina.

I found the lump in her left breast one night while making love. It stopped my heart, dried my mouth and placed a perpetual weight in my belly.

It was advanced and had already spread to the other breast. The doctors wanted her to abort the pregnancy but at 16 weeks, our son wouldn't survive. She refused treatment, telling me that there was no guarantee that she would survive even if with surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. If she were to meet her end the way her mother and aunt did, she wanted to leave behind someone for me to love.

She agreed to a double mastectomy and no more, although the doctors were sure that it would not rid her of the cancer completely, merely slow it down enough for our son to be born.

We fought. We cried. And in the end, when her eyes were red with tears, puffy and she could barely form a sentence, I relented. No one should have to choose between their child and the one they love.

Days later, I sat in the waiting room of Denver Medical surrounded by both of our families. We prayed, we begged, but mostly we cried because for Sango, Kohaku and Miroku, they had been here before.

Six hours later, she emerged from surgery, groggy and disoriented with a deflated chest and asked me if I still thought she was a woman.

"Of course, how could I not?" I set my palm on her belly and for the first time, felt the bubbling of life. Her stomach was made more prominent by the lack of breasts. But I didn't care. When I was at my worse, she stood by me and so likewise I promised myself that I wouldn't abandon her now, no matter what happened.

The cancer was not fully eradicated by the operation and so we waited living day by day, for the pregnancy to progress far enough for both mother and child to be healthy.

I watched helplessly as she became weaker, more tired, lost weight and her skin became ashen with illness. But her belly grew, blooming with life. Each night she thanked me and promised that she wouldn't let go. Not yet.

She thought I didn't hear her crying at night, when the pain came, the nausea and vomiting. I held a basin up to her mouth, cleaned her lips and held her aching body. "I'm not leaving," she said. "Not yet. Just hold me."

I tried to quit coaching to spend more time with her, but neither my family or hers would allow it. Truth be told, there was some comfort in watching Jaliel swing from horizontal bar, or twirl on the pommel horse. In those moments when a broad grin would pass his face and he'd get excited because he mastered something I did at his age that I forgot about my fear of losing Rin.

One morning in March, a year after my surgery, she was finally far enough along, and our son's lungs strong enough for the doctors to take him early. They sedated her, performed a c-section and again I was left helpless when my son, Kane was whisked off to the NICU and my wife the opposite direction to oncology to immediately begin radiation therapy.

Kane weighed only 4lbs 6oz. He nestled into my palms the first time I held him, breathing peacefully as if he'd known them all along. I sang to my son, promising him that no matter what happened, Daddy would be with him always.

In another section of the hospital, my love cried and vomitted over an emesis basin as the radiation and chemotherapy took her long black hair in droves.

When Kane was released, weeks before Rin, Kohaku moved in with us to care for him.

I split my time between the hospital and home. Rin cried seeing videos of our son, unable to hold him because of the restrictions placed on chemo-patients.

Her happiest moment was five weeks later when she was released from the hospital and allowed to hold her son for the first time. She breathed in the sweet scent and smiled. A smile so bright it shamed the sun and paled the stars.

One sunny day in Spring, I finally stood on my own, leaning heavily on a walker with braces on my legs. I slowly learned to move my legs on my own. Rin watched me from the recliner in the living room with Kane on her lap. "See Daddy is learning to walk, just like you will one day."

Today has been a somber day. I dress in black, preparing myself to go to the cemetery for the funeral. The baby is dressed in a simple black onesie, held by his Uncle Shippo, while Kohaku straightens his tie in front of a mirror.

Next to me Jaliel and his brother Jackson finish tying their shoes. "I can't believe this happened," Kohaku says quiet, rubbing his face.

"She's waiting for us," I remind them, before once again we're overcome by emotions and late to the cemetery.

Shippo straps Kane into the middle seat in the back of my car. Jayden and Jackson sit on either side of the baby. The two Uncles drive together in their own car while mother joins me in mine. "Are you sure you don't want me to drive Sesshomaru?"

"No," I answer stiffly. "I'll be fine."

She wipes a tear from her eye as I pull out of the driveway.

The grave is surrounded with roses and lilies from my garden. The closer we approach it, the more Jackson and Jayden cry and I too follow suit. Tears sting the corners of my eyes. This is not what was meant to happen.

I take Rin's hand, finding her in the throng of people. She had come early to put the final touches on Alexandra's grave.

She died three days before in a car accident, leaving Jaliel and Jackson orphans. Rather than leaving the boys to the system, like Sango and Miroku had done for Rin, Kohaku and Shippo, we decided to take the boys in and raise them ourselves. She kisses my cheek, and holds my hand in hers. "I can't believe this happened."

"Neither can I," I mutter, yet a part of me is grateful, because just before we were told of the accident we were told that she was in remission and that it looked hopeful that it would stay that way permanently.

"I love you," she tells me softly. "You know it's okay to cry. She was a sweet lady."

"How do we make sure they don't forget their mother?"

"We'll go to their home and gather pictures, make collages and talk to everyone who knew her. Writing it down helps," Rin answers.

It's a short ceremony. We hold the boys while they cry over their mother's grave and when the clouds turn gray, take them home. Miroku said it must be tradition now, that we stitch family together from shattered souls. But with a little love and kindness, anything that is broken can be healed. The pieces put back together and hope restored on the wings of eagles.

And with that, I take my family, my wife, my three children home for rocky road, because all journeys have their bumps. But we will traverse them together. Always.

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE COMMENT AND/OR KUDO! 
> 
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